Wyred DACS

>What settings were you using in JRiver?<

I more or less have stumbled into getting this set up:

JRiver 15.0.106, Kernel Streaming, Win7 (64bit)
USB to W4SDAC2 using W4S USB Driver.
working very well!

Thats it. But I have found Play under the MAC to be a bit better - clearer to my ears.

Thanks
Bill

New here but have been following this thread for a while. I also have the DAC2 and tried the JR with XP however, using KS and have been thinking to buy the full license. It is very musical, relaxed and very resolving I may add.

My setup is:
XP with W4S Asynch drivers and JR(KS) or XXHighEnd(KS) (testing both currently)
USB (WW Starlight6 usb)
DAC2 directly driving the W4S ST500 via balanced ic's.

I used the JR for a few days and the results are very good. Recently I gave a shot to the XXHighEnd which brought things to another level. Specially with female vocals the results are astonishing and there is now lots of air around the singers and instruments. On a side note the nice thing with JR is that you can have it read directly from a CD and output via usb to DAC2 (thus you may not need to turn the CD to FLAC). I also tried the up-sampling (for CD playback) used in JR and it gave me the impression that restricts the air around recordings. The sound does become slightly more analytical but I think there is a slight compression as well. It is best to leave DAC2 do its job alone. JR is very good all around and I may still get it, but memory playing with XXHighEnd seriously got my attention.

Kudos to W4S for such a wonderful DAC (and power amp)!

Cheers and happy listening!

Digilog5,
What speakers are being driven by the Wyred amp?

While my pre-amp is getting a slight upgrade and a replacement volume pot, I'm going straight from my DAC-2 to my Musical Fidelity A3.2cr amp and it's sounding a little harsh in the upper register. Wondering if its a weakness in my amp that my pre has been hiding.

Right now the amp drives a pair of ML-Sources due to space restrictions. I also have a pair of older yet wonderful ML SL3s but at a different location which I would like to try with the w4s one day. I am sure it will do fine.

Granted that the little Source has its limitations (in terms of uniformity I would say) it is still very very transparent and still...an electrostat.

Driven from XP with KS and Jriver, the W4S combo sound is wonderful. Never harsh, yet very detailed. Cables are DH labs (BL1 balanced ic & Q10s for the speakers). I also hookedup an old DVDp as transport that was lying around (with a Theta Coax cable) and still the sound was fairly nice, very smooth and relaxed, but felt that using JR with a good USB gave a cleaner sound, more transparent, but never harsh. I actually enjoyed this combo tremendously.

Driven from XP with XXHighEnd, there is additional clarity over JR as if a veil lifted, it is more focused and it does feel a bit brighter now but in a nice way, with some recordings. Nevertheless, the 3D image is outstanding and most recordings sound very good.

I would assume, since the DAC2 is dual differential balanced, theoretically it may be better to drive a dual mono setup with balanced ics. I havent listened to the MF A3.2 Cr amp but given the MF pedigree it should be very musical sounding. Can it be something in the cabling or the speakers themselves?