Still Looking for a DAC - Audio Mirror Tubadour v and ANK Audio 5.1

Thanks for the update and really glad things eventually settled in to your liking — that’s gotta be a bit of a relief!  I’d be very interested to hear your impressions of the MC2 once it settles into your system (I’ve found even used cables need some time to adjust).

I’m very glad it’s working out for you and I’m sure it will get better. My Audio Note sounded good out of the box, but much better after about 2 months. Also, with any dacs, but especially tubes, IMO, warm up time makes a difference. For me an hour is minimum, but after 2 it’s even better. I was considering an AM, as Vlad seems to also believe in non-oversampling chips and no traditional filtering as does AN, but as the AM prices rose significantly with the new models, the  price difference wasn’t that much. 

Hey, folks, I guess a little update is in order, I promise I’ll be short :)

The unit went through different stages of transformation, and when it finally settled down I couldn’t believe my ears - the sound was smooth, big and immensely enjoyable. Gone were those irritating frequencies, and it’s not that I got used to them, my tinnitus won’t let me. As of now, I can’t remove it from my system, it sounds so pure I can’t even describe it.

I also tried using it with all-silver cabling, and the result was great, no irritation of any kind, even my Nordost Silver Shadow sounds great.

In short it’s an extremely musical device, and highly recommended.

I sent Vlad WE 417a tubes, and he’s making adapters, I’m very curious about their capabilities.

So, this is all for now. Thanks to everyone for participating in this thread.

Oh, forgot to mention that the size was a big factor for getting it since I have very little space on my rack.

What an unbelievable device, I must say. Now I’m using it with the Western Electric JW 5842 tubes (mil version of 417A). I can’t say they’re much better that the stock ones, but the sound now is different - bigger and more tubey. I also replaced the stock 6z4 rectifier to Soviet-made 6C4P-EV, which is a plug’n’play replacement tube. It’s always fun to try different tubes. So far it’s easily one of my favorite components.

Feel completely happy now. Next step will be replacing the streamer. The BS Node is definitely not in the same league.