Opinions on PS Audio Direct Stream DAC (Mk 1)

@jmeyers When I was in college, I took a course in audio engineering from James Boyk, a pianist/recording engineer. He used to say that no measurement has ever been found that correlates with sound quality. He typically judged tubes and analog as performing better than solid state and digital, and when he said the sound quality was "good", he meant it faithfully reproduced the live sound. He had a lot of experience in recording sessions hearing both the live sound, and then hearing the reproduced sound in the control room, back-to-back. He did consulting for Sheffield Lab, and if you are familiar with their recordings, you will know they are very high resolution, very dynamic (micro- and macro-). 

Specifically about the PS Audio, the fact the it has an output transformer might be related to the measured harmonic distortion. It doesn't prevent the PS Audio from having high resolution, but I don't have a more technical explanation than that.

Feel free to enjoy any audio gear despite measurements telling you otherwise. There are interesting arguments to be made as to what exactly those measurements tell us, and why they might be the way they are... but the bottom line is that we like what we like. And there's nothing wrong with that. Don't let a chart or a number on a spec sheet tell you how to listen. 

As for the original PS Audio DirectStream DAC, this is in fact a great deal. Despite being "older" by now, it's still a great sounding device. 

Op,

I have found that with the exception of the very grossest measures like wpc (that is also doubling into lower impedance) measurements are largely meaningless. I mean seriously. I do not look at them. Waste of time.
 

Early on in my pursuit of the high end I was fooled repeatedly by looking at them. Honestly, in main stream high end the best correlation with sound quality is price and weight (taking into account the intended sound quality type… like detailed with lots of slam, musical / natural… etc).

I seem to have turned a corner with my unit. I have made no changes yet (have a Morrow I2S cable on the way), but as of yesterday great things seem to be happening. I was afraid it was wishful thinking so I waited until today and I’m listening to it as I type this. Detail is MUCH better all of a sudden. I’ve got less than 10 hrs of listening time on it so that seems way too little to chalk it up to breaking in. The master power switch has been on since I got it, though, so I guess thermal stability could be a factor.

I’ve found the bass to be "prodigious" since hour one, so much so that I actually dialed it back a little with PEQ. But now I’ve turned PEQ back off, as the bass seems to have corrected itself (I wouldn’t want to use the term "mellowed" because it’s still got bass in spades). I just tried listening from the XLR outputs of the EverSolo DMP-A8 and I preferred the sound going through the Direct Stream, hands down, and I preferred the DMP-A8 to the Octo Research DAC. What stands out to me? It sounds really dynamic, with music sounding more "full" and fleshed out. I’m really looking forward to future improvement through cable upgrades and further break-in, but I’m pretty happy with it right now.

I’m now ready to say that I’m definitely keeping it. My only decision is if I want to send it off to APS to bring it up to "Signature" status. I’ll certainly wait a while to see where I end up with it as is.

I'm the OP. I've listened for a while and given it a few hundred hours of burn-in just in case that was needed. I'm giving up on it for two reasons: too bright, and weak bass (poor pitch definition). I'm using it with a headphone system, mostly: a classic LCD-2 and an LCD-X, together with a custom 12AU7/FET headphone amplifier that is very extended and powerful. 

I sensed it as too bright. For instance, in chamber music, the instruments in the upper registers tended to stand out much more than the lower instruments. Or in a piece by Chopin, the pianist's right hand dominated the texture far too much. 

The bass had poor pitch definition. First, the midbass was recessed. I could barely hear some midbass notes in classical pieces. Easier in rock, but didn't really provide a firm foundation. The deep bass sounded like an unpitched thump (poor pitch definition).

The brightness is not really a "bad" thing--maybe it's a good system match for darker speakers. I don't know how to explain the bass problems.

The Music Room says they will accept returns with a smallish restocking fee, but I'm not sure what the time limit is. I'm at 29 days since ordering it.