Mr.Sneis

The Koss is smoother and less bright than the 207 which in turn supposedly is supposed to be more neutral than the 407 model. The 207 tended towards brightness with better than 252s amps, I personally founnd the ESP950 to scale better than the 207 as well so slapping it on the 007tii should reap some real benefits. The koss is no slouch even next to the L700. Don't pay Darin Fong what he is asking for his stax adapter cable, it's just way too expensive for what he is asking. The extension cable was about $15 before the Massdrop run; I think these are hard to come by at present. The Amphenol plug is about $15-$20 via ebay sources or even Moon Audio. The solder work can be a little tricky and the fit and finish will be a little awkward due to the cable shape and connector form factor but it is what it is.

It's a long story this DAC but I can try to PM you later on with impressions.

Well it turns out I only needed to expand my skillset; touched up the chip by hand with a few passes of drag soldering technique and it is in business. Learned to not be too loosey goosey with the wick removal as well, bent some pins when I made a false move which could have been a quick job but more like an extra hour.

Hot air rework needed on a pmd200... Any advice for a guy who's just OK with a regular old iron? I'm local to a shop called circuit specialists that sells some lower end tools like this one for about $60: https://www.circuitspecialists.com/csi8786d_digital_hot_air_rework_station_with_soldering_iron.html Also frys locally has super chintzier looking stuff for $100: https://www.frys.com/product/6389401?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG I do have a large supply of junk older gear to practice on as well thankfully.

Justin, any chance of interior shots?

That 3.0 schematic on their site but is awful resolution!

Been up with them for about a month. No progress made yet but when I spoke to their tech last he had said he needs to get the schematic from some guy in NL who may or may not have had it. He was pretty sure the problem lied in the digital board at least. Should probably try to hit them up again.

R2R is ultra popular again, manufacturers seem to be building them but vintage stuff also. Schiit and Metrum I think should be credited for a bit of this resurgence and making the cost somewhat affordable. I think Audio-GD is still big pimping pcm1704. USB is still crapshoot, it's gotten a lot better but the use of $$$$ expensive converters has gotten even more insane (like audio over ethernet). PS Audio really jumped the shark IMO with their super expensive Directstream DAC upgrade since the perfectwave days. Not too sure what happened to the cetoole analog upgrade board mods for older opamp based dacs, I think they disappeared or dried up. I've relegated myself to the vinyl realm and tried to look back but then got super screwed so I'm pretty much 98% out of the dac games now.

I'm not too familiar with how VMP works exactly but looks like I missed the train on the gorillaz album; I would join if I could but is it possible for you guys that are already members to buy a second ?

I'm done giving him the benefit of the doubt. I bought this DAC from Dreamwhisper and would not recommend anyone giving him any sort of trust in the future. He's been zero help and has been awful at any sort of reply. I love this hobby but stuff like this really just kills the enthusiasm. Will be going through the motions with PCX.

Without a doubt NoNoNoNoNoNo did this one. Why the heck is his name censored.

Yeah, trying to give him the benefit of the doubt so to speak trying to do what I can with what i have. Just sent a pm pleading to work out a return even though its across country and shipping is not insigificant. It's more likely the shoddy workmanship of NoNoNoNoNoNo that caused this than anything, very sad and stressful situation.

Unfortunately it didn't come to me for free! Purchased from a reasonably trustworthy member with a MO across countries, he hasn't truly gotten back to me either.

I purchased this DAC from another HC'er in Canada down to the states but it looks like maybe he didn't get around to testing it out before selling it to me as it locks onto digital signals but provides no useful output otherwise. I only have a glimpse of the history of this thing but it's lived a rough life. I am positive old forum favorite NoNoNoNoNoNo is the previous previous owner and the work here is very very bad. Lots of WTF and cold solder joints everywhere and bonus scorch marks on some box caps, that odd white wire is a jumper used after he lifted a pcb trace... As a novice I have since cleaned this thing up as far as I can get it, at least at my skill level, which includes removing all of the crazy bypasses and dexa regulators for 7805//7905 still no joy. Also looked to be a bit of soda or coffee spill near the power board and switches but it cleaned up OK and all regulators actually seem to test out fine. Have reached out to partsconnexion but no real schematic seems to exist. If anyone's willing to help me out with this thing or work on it for reasonable sum I would be greatly appreciative, otherwise I may have to suck it up and ship it to pcx. No magic smoke or obvious damage. The opamps are getting proper +/- 15v and a passive IV test seems to be no output as well. When locked on and powered up I can hear some intermittent static noises. And here it is currently all cleaned up.

https://www.audiogon.com/listings/amplifiers-stax-srm-252s-portable-amplifier-for-stax-009-2016-12-29-headphones-07853-long-valley-nj Hahaha, WHAT? Lots of wtf on quite a few levels.