Denarips and Vinshine split

I tried the Ares II and sold it pretty quickly. In my room acoustics, r2r just doesn't do it for me. And I never wanted to go up the Denafrips latter because of their lack of remote. However Alvin is a great guy and I wish him the best with this unfortunate situation for Vinshine. I still dealt with him for non Denafrips products, like the Jay's cdt2-mk3 and LHY SW-10. There are very few gentlemen as helpful and courteous as him in the business.

Generally, "grey market" means you forego any warranty. I used to buy photo and video equipment and sometimes would take a chance but no more. A $500 item might be worth the risk, but for my wallet, anything more than $1000 better be the "real deal" with a manufacturer’s warranty. [Along with good reviews from customers who had to use the warranty service.]

The issue for Denafrips going forward is will they try selling direct or will they put forth the effort to have someone like Alvin again to give customers the assurance they need to spend $2000 and up on a Chi-Fi DAC?

I was set on getting a Pontus II -12th or 15th, whatever they called it, but now, well, probably not. I’ll keep looking. Maybe a chip-based DAC with a FPGA DSP will be the ticket, if it could offer all that "natural tonality, with great imaging and a wide soundstage" associated with R2R - and still give me some bass slam and definition.

Just watched the video that I think @fthompson251 was referring to:

Official Announcement: Farewell to DENAFRIPS - YouTube

As mentioned by others, Alvin is a class act.

They're lack of a return possibility means I'd never order anything from them. I'm sure he'll land on his feet.

Wow Alvin is a class act.