DonkeyBalls

I was going to use "Tony" but that was taken, so DonkeyBalls was sure to be free. I was mildly drunk at the time. That shouldn't be a surprise.

Might get shredded for saying this. I take anything Tyll says with a large grain of salt after he labeled the dreadful 430HA as a "reference amp". That unit is veiled, slow and lacking in dynamics. I get more transparent and impactful performance from my 300B tube amp. Reference SQ the 430HA is NOT. Warm and musical yes. Transparent or "reference grade" - no.

For those that have experienced PriceJapan going "dark" over the past few weeks, this was just posted on the site:

Really interesting thread - thank you.

I would if I could, but I live a long way from civilization, so that isn't practical. I am trying to get some feedback on the more extreme claims that are being made for the Yggy - that it beats best of breed DACs around the 8K to 10K range - like the Meitner MA-1 / MSB Analog / Bricasti M1 / BADA2 etc. Lots of folks say that the Yggy is great, and I don't doubt it is very good for the money, but does it really compete with (or beat) the heavy hitters @ 3 or 4 times the price? Not a lot of A/B comparisons out there against these uber DACs from folks that aren't part of the HF/SBAF hype train. I did find one comparing the MSB Analog vs Yggy in some detail. The reviewer's conclusion is that the Yggy is excellent for the price, but does not dethrone the MSB Analog.

I ended up going with a Bricasti M1. It is an excellent DAC and beats the pants of my previous units (Auralic Vega and Hegel HD30), but then it should considering the price. Maybe the Yggy would have delivered 90% of the performance for 30% of the price - not sure. I live in New Zealand so it is "Buy to Try" for much audio gear. The Bricasti is expensive, but a relatively sure bet. The hype around the Yggy on HF and SBAF has been heavy and intense - that makes me very cautious - been burned before on new product hype.

The hype train around the Yggy over on "that other forum" and also SBAF is rocketing along at warp speed. Some of the claims are a little extreme and I was hoping some of the Head Case folks might give some input. There are claims out there that the Yggy beats the best of breed DACs that sit around the 8K to 10K mark - DACs like MSB Analog, Bricasti M1, Berkeley Audio Dac 2 ... etc. That is a very hefty claim to make. I am very unlikely to ever have the opportunity to A/B test the Yggy against these uber DACs myself - have any of the Head Case folks had that chance and care to share their thoughts?

Not to mention utterly OT in a Simaudio 430HA thread. Why post about Dmitry and his shitty amp in this thread?

Got a bit carried away with the new freedom here. Over at "that other site" you could not even mildly criticize a product, especially a site sponsor's product, without an avalanche of shit falling about your head. Some of it from mods/admins and the rest from stalker fanbois.

Simaudio make some hot gear - I like their pre / power / integrated amps quite a bit - but they really shat the bed in grand style with the 430HA. Massive shit bath. Like a shit bath jumped into a bigger shit bath to take a huge shit. A galaxy of shitness. God it feels good to say this. HeadFi is such a shitty site.

I like to start with a healthy dose of retard right out of the gate. Can only improve from there. V281 does indeed have a dose of warmth and musicality. Where it differs to the 430HA is that it doesn't sacrifice speed, punch, detail and dynamics to get there. The 430HA was a big failure for me. I was getting noticeably better speed, dynamics, detail ... etc from my 300B tube amp. Admittedly this is a Glenn custom job and an exceptionally good tube amp, but still, when a SS amp gets its ass handed to it by a tube rig in exactly those areas where SS is supposed to dominate you know there is a problem.

double post - apologies.

My first head-case post. Please excuse me if I don't quite get it right the first time. I bought my 430HA soon after the initial release, having used and liked some Simaudio products previously. Big mistake. The 430HA has great musicality and nice warmth. The build quality and feature set are both excellent. Unfortunately this comes at the cost of the SQ. Slow, veiled, boring. Not a great amp and utterly lacking in transparency. I was very surprised that Tyll raved about it and put it on the Wall Of Fame. My view is that any "reference" amp should be, above all else, a transparent device. The 430HA is anything but. I sold mine a few months later and bought a Violectric V281. A much, much better amp.