Tigerjones
Bagpuss
Calm down Cliff its just a commercial (DAC)
Quite right Cliff, lets face it who cares about its circuitry or the circuitry of any other DAC, **** I can hardly even spell circuitry. Stay strong Cliff.
I don't think this is true Mark, I find the Beresford great for music listening, I haven't compared it with other DAC's but have had no complaints at all.
No Mark, it addresses your petty point scoring "the circuit has not changed since 1999" post.
I am happy to ridicule ad nauseam any tosser who thinks I just defend purchases made on the basis of cut and paste...In what way does that make me dependent on linked postings from Stereophile for audio enjoyment?
The DAC1 I have and use (mainly) for work on the end of a DVD player to feed sound to the backup system works well, so well in fact that it makes (on the end of a Meridian 500) a laughing stock out of the SB+
Yes. The Beresford has a more fleshed out sound with greater drive and weight in the bass. The Benchmark is more 'airy' and lithe in balance. It can sound quite good with sympathetically recorded material, but makes badly recorded material unlistenable. It's not bright or harsh, rather it shows these recordings as being anaemic ad flat.
Lefty
Exactly what I found when I did a similar dem at AlexS's. The Densen driving digits into the DAC1 managed to give the best sound from the DAC1 in exactly the areas Lefty mentions - the Densen alone was better still.
regards
Jason
So.. Where is that perfect DAC.
There is a DAX decade in the classifieds, are they up to the job?
The best bit of advice for ages, congrats.Spend your money and worrying time on other parts of the system - room and speakers.
Andrew
So lefty, you've bought a £700 DAC and a couple of hundred quids worth of cable to try and improve the sound from your £170 SB3?
Why not simply buy a better network music player - Transporter, SB+ or the new Linn thing spring to mind
The best bit of advice for ages, congrats.
Peter
OK, Chord Chorus arrived this morning. Got them plugged in and whilst there's now more 'beef' to the low frequencies, the upper mid is still under-nourished and a bit thin and reedy.
I think this DAC's days are numbered in my system...
Lefty
I am using bigger fuses and one of RKRs Beast power cables on my DAC1 with noticable improvements in every aspect to my ears.
I also now use the DAC1 as a pre-amp. It is worth noting that when first using the Benchmark as a pre-amp it sounded muffled in comparison to the fixed calibrated setting. It seems to have de-muffled itself after a period of burn in with this setting?????? I guess the pre-amp section has components not used in the fixed calibrated mode? I have since gone back and compared the calibrated setting against the adjustable volume pre-amp setting and found there to be little difference now?
Anyway - my main question is: Has anybody listened to a modified DAC1 that two or three companies now offer stateside? fyi http://www.empiricalaudio.com/frmods.html#Benchmark DAC-1 Turbomod
Yup, except I bought them both secondhand and so paid considerably less than the £900 they retail for. I agree with you in principle though. If my budget were to increase then I would look at a SB+ before the likes of something like a Chord DAC 64.
Lefty
...found the BM to be cheaper and more or less the same as a DAC64.