- Joined
- Oct 11, 2007
- Messages
- 8,590
- Reaction score
- 520
I recently to a major leap of faith and sold my trusty digital companion of 17 yrs. The pcm1704 dac served me well. But it was time for change. I feel the dac reached its limit and i wanted more.
Enter the soekris. Fantastic piece of raw engineering and stock it sounds pretty darn good. But we all know it can be better......or did you?
The soekris comes standard with two output modes. Opamp buffer and raw. The opamp on the output of this rev4 is a pretty ordinary opa1602. The sound is bordering on edgy and it can be better. Pretty low output impedance of about 50. But switch to raw and you discover a word filled with detail but with a ver smooth presentation. Still fairly acceptable output impedance of about 600.
BUT. this is where it becomes a bit more complicated. The presentation is dry. It lats the musicality that i am used to with the pcm1704 and the MU follower tube output. Ultimately that is what one would want from any piece of equipment.
How to make it better? Well you could experiment with various fancy dual opamps. Or you could find a way to improve on the RAW output of the dac. Well the latter facinates me much more.
So the hunt is on to get a partner for the soekris.
First up will be a Pass B1 buffer, with more ideas down the line. But the allure of a well executed valve stage still remains first prize.
Enter the soekris. Fantastic piece of raw engineering and stock it sounds pretty darn good. But we all know it can be better......or did you?
The soekris comes standard with two output modes. Opamp buffer and raw. The opamp on the output of this rev4 is a pretty ordinary opa1602. The sound is bordering on edgy and it can be better. Pretty low output impedance of about 50. But switch to raw and you discover a word filled with detail but with a ver smooth presentation. Still fairly acceptable output impedance of about 600.
BUT. this is where it becomes a bit more complicated. The presentation is dry. It lats the musicality that i am used to with the pcm1704 and the MU follower tube output. Ultimately that is what one would want from any piece of equipment.
How to make it better? Well you could experiment with various fancy dual opamps. Or you could find a way to improve on the RAW output of the dac. Well the latter facinates me much more.
So the hunt is on to get a partner for the soekris.
First up will be a Pass B1 buffer, with more ideas down the line. But the allure of a well executed valve stage still remains first prize.
