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£100 DAC beats Klimax Renew DS

gidders

hifi enthusiast, golfer & photographer
OK as always that's not the whole story, but hear me out
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For the past couple of weeks I've been exploring streaming services with trial subscriptions to Spotify, premium, Tidal Hifi, Qobuz & Deezer.

I love the Spotify interface, breadth of the catalogue & its artist & track radio functions to find new music, and while their 320kpbs stream sounds OK, its not as good as hifi -16 / 44.1 streams the others offer.

I'm also loving the fact that Tidal offer some material in 24bit whereas you have to subscribe to Qobuz sublime+ to get that, & Deezer don't offer anything over CD res. OH... BUT YOU CAN'T DECODE 24 bit MQA FILES ON A DS :'(

Which brings me back to my original assertion - £100 DAC beats Klimax Renew DS

Firing up Tidal Desktop app on my laptop, which will decode MQA files, & outputting through my £100 dac at 24/96, this sounds better than the same file played at 16/44.1 through Kazoo to my KRDS
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The other benefit of using the desktop app/dac set up is the ability to access Tidal's artist & track radio functions to find new music.

OK comparing like for like a 16/44.1 sounds better through the KRDS than the £100 DAC - phew!

I wish Linn would implement MQA decoding, & artist & track radio via Kazoo
 
You posted exactly this on the Linn forum too, and ‘neglected’ to mention the make of your £100 DAC there as well...
 
You posted exactly this on the Linn forum too, and ‘neglected’ to mention the make of your £100 DAC there as well...

The DAC is a Novation Audiohub which is really a musicians ADC/DAC for recording, but I don't think that's relevant. Comparing like for like ie playing either a 16/44.1 or 24/96 through both, the Linn is significantly ahead. BUT as the Linn cant decode Tidal hires, so comparing Tidal 24/96 through the DAC vs the same file in 16/44.1 through the KRDS & the DAC sounds better
 
If you like lossy formats like MQA and some people do, especially through earbuds, you should give MP2 and MP3 a go sometime and see if you can find a dac, or phone, you like better.
 
The DAC is a Novation Audiohub which is really a musicians ADC/DAC for recording, but I don't think that's relevant. Comparing like for like ie playing either a 16/44.1 or 24/96 through both, the Linn is significantly ahead. BUT as the Linn cant decode Tidal hires, so comparing Tidal 24/96 through the DAC vs the same file in 16/44.1 through the KRDS & the DAC sounds better

I know what you mean. Using MQA files my DAC (a Mytek Brooklyn) was much better than an Esoteric K-07X. Like for like the Esoteric is better.
 
The DAC is a Novation Audiohub which is really a musicians ADC/DAC for recording, but I don't think that's relevant. Comparing like for like ie playing either a 16/44.1 or 24/96 through both, the Linn is significantly ahead. BUT as the Linn cant decode Tidal hires, so comparing Tidal 24/96 through the DAC vs the same file in 16/44.1 through the KRDS & the DAC sounds better

Fair enough - ta for that. Abbydog is correct though. MQA *is* lossy...
 
I think I know where problem might be.
I was testing my klimax ds1 in my friends system. When system was good but source not good enough klimax was making big difference. But one friend has very avarage system and his cheap dac sounded as good as klimax. Why? Because rest of the system was as good as his poor dac. System will sound as good as the weakest elements.
 
I think I know where problem might be.
I was testing my klimax ds1 in my friends system. When system was good but source not good enough klimax was making big difference. But one friend has very avarage system and his cheap dac sounded as good as klimax. Why? Because rest of the system was as good as his poor dac. System will sound as good as the weakest elements.

Per my signature, the rest of the system is Naim 82 with Witch Hat superlink mod, TPSC, 2 x 250s bi amped into Kudos C2s... so I don't think that's the problem!
 
Please explain. MQA claim to offer studio master quality ie better than 16/44.1 CD res

That is not true. If you start with a 24/96 studio master and put it through the MQA encode/decode process you do not get the original 24/96 file. There is no dispute about this. MQA claim that the difference is inaudible, which it may be, but they accept that there is a difference. If you want genuine Studio Master quality you can either buy it from the likes of Linn and Hyperion and Qobuz, or stream it directly from Qobuz Sublime +. What seems particularly sneaky about MQA is that the undecoded MQA is worse than CD quality - about 13bits according to some.
 
So, you have bought a device that won't accept external connections and your preferred service works best on a computer.

I have to confess though, even if you had a DSM, I imagine the differences would be marginal at best. I have an Akurate 5.1/D and, whilst it sounds bloody excellent, for stereo audio it's marginally smoother and less tinkly bright than the DacMagic it replaced (although it does a whole lot more).
 
That is not true. If you start with a 24/96 studio master and put it through the MQA encode/decode process you do not get the original 24/96 file. There is no dispute about this. MQA claim that the difference is inaudible, which it may be, but they accept that there is a difference. If you want genuine Studio Master quality you can either buy it from the likes of Linn and Hyperion and Qobuz, or stream it directly from Qobuz Sublime +. What seems particularly sneaky about MQA is that the undecoded MQA is worse than CD quality - about 13bits according to some.

Give me this kind of lossy. Through a fully enabled MQA DAC it sounds brilliant!

And Tidal Masters (MQA) sounds almost always much better than the redbook files.

Should Spotify one day adopt it I'd be truly happy.
 
Funny I have a Brooklyn and mqa either sounds the same or worse, never better. If one is particularly anal there's plenty of remasters of most big albums to waste your time with, I'm just not that type of obsessive.
 
Funny I have a Brooklyn and mqa either sounds the same or worse, never better. If one is particularly anal there's plenty of remasters of most big albums to waste your time with, I'm just not that type of obsessive.

Your unit must have some kind of defect.
(I'm not joking).
 
Give me this kind of lossy. Through a fully enabled MQA DAC it sounds brilliant!

And Tidal Masters (MQA) sounds almost always much better than the redbook files.

Should Spotify one day adopt it I'd be truly happy.

Hi Radamel,

I’m looking to fully unfold MQA as my current Dac is not capable. I’m on a limited budget. Would a Meridian 2 suffice for now do you think?
 


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