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End Game Digital (2023)

Again to be fair, when I spoke to him some years ago he sounded a charming, decent sort of chap
I bought my RME from Keith and spoke on the phone. I tire of the drab, patronising monotony of his posts here, that’s all. I don’t even mind the roundabout salesmanship, that ball is in Tony’s court.

Neither do I ever ignore or report any poster. Keith gets back as much as he gives here and when his ego needs a good massage he can go back to ASR.

Anyway, I’ll take a pit stop before the next circuit and only discuss state of the art digital solutions that are not Chinese (or Russian, North Korean etc, to broaden my ‘xenophobia’).
 
The Resolution Audio Cantata 3.0 is reported to be in the league of dcs etc. it’s about 9k new or 5k used. Has a cd drive too.
 
Looks interesting. I know the Opus 21 well enough but had never heard of this. Ideally it would have an SACD drive but if the CD layer is good enough it's not an issue. I'd also ideally want BNC coax in but perhaps that can be configured. I guess my, perhaps unfounded, reservations compared to dCS would be support/longevity and resale value (particularly if buying new). Are any PFM members owners of this..?
 
Unfortunately there will never be an end game where digital is concerned because the technology is constantly changing. Chips become obsolete almost after the first batch of chips have been made. Think of anything digital like your mobile phone and in a few years you will need to change it.
 
When you see the incredible technology packed in such low price contraptions, those DAC thingies don’t look like good value at all.
 
Unfortunately there will never be an end game where digital is concerned because the technology is constantly changing. Chips become obsolete almost after the first batch of chips have been made. Think of anything digital like your mobile phone and in a few years you will need to change it.

The problem to my mind is bespoke displays and FPGA stuff that is so tightly tied to one manufacturer. Digital audio is actually very simple and a genuinely good high-end DAC from 20-30 years ago, actually even longer, is still a very good DAC and should still be serviceable. There are many happy users of vintage Sony, Naim, Accuphase, DPA, Meridian etc digital kit, even the very first Sonys and Philips out the gate can be still serviced by those with the skills. It’s just computer technology, and in the case of most digital audio really quite ancient 16 bit stuff at its core if one just wants to play CDs. Digital tech needn’t be scary at all. It is nowhere near as ‘cutting edge’ as much marketing copy suggests. High-res has been standard studio tech for decades now. It is a mature technology.

PS The area I’d avoid at all costs is hardware streamers. That stuff really is very near-future landfill. Far better to buy a great DAC that should last pretty much indefinitely and a Raspberry Pi or equivalent for the streaming bit!
 
Unfortunately there will never be an end game where digital is concerned because the technology is constantly changing. Chips become obsolete almost after the first batch of chips have been made. Think of anything digital like your mobile phone and in a few years you will need to change it.

That applies to serviceability I guess, but only if one of the chips fail - it’s the Wadia’s & dCS level this comes into play. Never had to check with Wadia, but 3 X-32 purchases so far and faults have been limited to PSU, connector and capacitor issues so easily fixed. The Delius I bought is unfortunately an early one from 2001 - in those days upgrades also included boot ROMs, unfortunately mine was never updated to a v2 ROM, and they’re no longer available (dCS support even had an engineer check for any old stock they had kicking around, no success), so it’s stuck where it is. Still sounds bloody good though :)

As mentioned above, I was looking at a 2014 dCS Vivaldi for CHF7k recently. Speaking to dCS this is fully upgradable to latest V2.x software as per current models, it’s only if you want Apex that it needs hardware too. That suggests they support the hardware chipset too? Not bad for a product released in 2011 I think. I really should have bought, even if only to make money - upgrade to v2 I could have done myself, £9k for for the apex upgrade, and I’d have had a player worth £38k! I’ve just never invested so much in hifi before :D

Richard
 
Unfortunately there will never be an end game where digital is concerned because the technology is constantly changing. Chips become obsolete almost after the first batch of chips have been made. Think of anything digital like your mobile phone and in a few years you will need to change it.
That’s not really true though. If a DAC works & you like how it sounds then you only need to change it if it stops working. Streamers are slightly different but most reputable manufacturers update the software continuously.

The phone analogy is a weak one as you really don’t ‘need’ to change them at all. My work I-phone 7 still does everything I need it to.
 
The problem to my mind is bespoke displays and FPGA stuff that is so tightly tied to one manufacturer. Digital audio is actually very simple and a genuinely good high-end DAC from 20-30 years ago, actually even longer, is still a very good DAC and should still be serviceable. There are many happy users of vintage Sony, Naim, Accuphase, DPA, Meridian etc digital kit, even the very first Sonys and Philips out the gate can be still serviced by those with the skills. It’s just computer technology, and in the case of most digital audio really quite ancient 16 bit stuff at its core if one just wants to play CDs. Digital tech needn’t be scary at all. It is nowhere near as ‘cutting edge’ as much marketing copy suggests. High-res has been standard studio tech for decades now. It is a mature technology.

PS The area I’d avoid at all costs is hardware streamers. That stuff really is very near-future landfill. Far better to buy a great DAC that should last pretty much indefinitely and a Raspberry Pi or equivalent for the streaming bit!
The PS section isn’t really true. Good quality streamers like Linn DSM, Innuos, Melco are supported & can last decades. You can argue whether they are worth it but even more budget offerings like the Node are still happily working many years down the line.
 
Kind of expensive when you’re chucking tens of thousands of pounds on a new black box.

Exactly. It makes me wonder what is going through people's minds when they are dropping £32,000 plus on a Taiko Server. The Taiko is beautifully built but they will be already working on the next generation, so the £32,000 you just spent will be worth what, when the new model comes out? I had a conversation with a top digital designer a few years back who was making some very nice DACs and was at the time offering his boards for OEM. He told me I should be designing and planning to make a new DAC every two years, due to chip availability and changes of technology. This did not sit comfortably with me at all as I design and build products to last a lifetime...
 
When you see the incredible technology packed in such low price contraptions, those DAC thingies don’t look like good value at all.

The low price stuff is designed to be disposable and is a blight on the planet IMHO. It is so environmentally irresponsible to mine finite materials to make disposable shite.

PS This is why, like Alex upthread, I try my level best to avoid cheap Chinese kit. I go further than the fact it is made with cheap labour in a dictatorship, I also care about the lack of serviceability and the total disregard of intellectual property rights and copyright. I just prefer to pay more for a product that will be useful and hold its value far longer. I consider good DACs such solid and trustworthy kit I’ll happily buy second hand. I’ve never understood the revolving door ‘DAC of the month club’ thing that goes on in some corners of the internet. They are very boring things IMHO, I happily use a 15 year old DPA unit I bought for peanuts ages ago. It is a really nice piece of kit and thankfully lacks any ugly displays etc on the front too!
 
The PS section isn’t really true. Good quality streamers like Linn DSM, Innuos, Melco are supported & can last decades. You can argue whether they are worth it but even more budget offerings like the Node are still happily working many years down the line.

Really not my area (I have no interest in anything beyond YouTube!) so I’m happy to be corrected. Can you connect a 20+ year old Linn streaming interface to Apple Music, Spotify, Tidal, Qoboz etc? I’d have thought the OS and processor technology would be hopelessly outdated by now, kind of like trying to browse the current internet on an iPhone 3.
 
That’s not really true though. If a DAC works & you like how it sounds then you only need to change it if it stops working. Streamers are slightly different but most reputable manufacturers update the software continuously.

I agree if you are just listening to CD or 16bit/44K files, but what about if someone wants to listen to DSD recordings, or MQA, or Roon and your DAC isn't capable of decoding this data? There are some excellent 16bit DACs still about. I just spent about £4K upgrading my first Tron Seven TDA1541 based DAC I built about 15 years ago and the performance from it now is incredible.
 
The problem to my mind is bespoke displays and FPGA stuff that is so tightly tied to one manufacturer. Digital audio is actually very simple and a genuinely good high-end DAC from 20-30 years ago, actually even longer, is still a very good DAC and should still be serviceable. There are many happy users of vintage Sony, Naim, Accuphase, DPA, Meridian etc digital kit, even the very first Sonys and Philips out the gate can be still serviced by those with the skills. It’s just computer technology, and in the case of most digital audio really quite ancient 16 bit stuff at its core if one just wants to play CDs. Digital tech needn’t be scary at all. It is nowhere near as ‘cutting edge’ as much marketing copy suggests. High-res has been standard studio tech for decades now. It is a mature technology.

PS The area I’d avoid at all costs is hardware streamers. That stuff really is very near-future landfill. Far better to buy a great DAC that should last pretty much indefinitely and a Raspberry Pi or equivalent for the streaming bit!

We could go a step further and decide that there's enough audio gear on the planet for current and future generations. But we're audiophiles, insatiable gear-craving creatures...
 
It depends whether any of the latest tech actually matters. Something like Graham’s above or this: https://www.audialonline.com/s5/ will doubtless give years of listening pleasure, especially if you stop reading the internet.
The ‘no-oversampling’ bit worries me though. It is incompatible with the ‘high-resolution’ part. Unless ‘hi-res’ means ‘high distortion’.
 


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