Continuation of R2R DAC Discussion From Stax Thread

[kevin gilmore]

well its 2016, soon to be 2017, and it might as well be 2009/2010

because lampizator is round 2 of singlepower.

I was waiting to get a picture of the board so that I could disprove just about everything lampizator has said, and found it.

here it is

The balanced output board is more of the same, its clear that the output tubes are a common cathode design, simple diode rectifiers and cap for the filament power, resistor plate load etc. This is an OUTPUT stage!  Not a I/V converter. Not anything else either.  Output capacitors are connected to the board and mounted with left handed skyhooks (also known as air) to the output connectors.

Some recent lampizator complete lies all but one completely disproven by pictures birgir has

1) the soekris dac is modified to be a current output dac, and the tube stage is the I/V converter

OK, flat out lie, the pictures shows that the voltage output of the soekris module is wired directly to the input/attenuator board. In fact there is absolutely no way to modify a R2R ladder dac to be current output, you need a multiplying dac, or a stack of current switches.

2) the soekris dac is modified by removing the +/-4V power supplies and driven with a super fancy  (as in pair of 3 terminal regulators) power supply, truth is that board up front is just a +/-12V simple power supply that also supplies power to the attenuator board.

3) the one I can't verify, that lampizator programs completely custom and proprietary firmware into the soekris.  No maybe a few filter changes, but the bulk of the firmware, not a chance. But really, the chance that this idiot can program something like that, you gotta be kidding.

TRUTH!

The soekris dac is used as both pcm and dsd, its hard to call something chipless with lvc595 shift registers as the output switches.

The output of the soekris dac goes directly to the attenuator board, the attenuator board goes directly to the tube output stage.

unregulated High voltage power supply also reminds me of Mikhail.

etc. and people are paying up to $20k for this, pretty soon some will be comparing the various kinds of wood used on the base of this thing.

Edited December 11, 2016 by kevin gilmore

[DefQon]

For old PCM-56-63 dac you also have the Monarchy Audio 22A and B dac's, they should pop up for under 600usd on the US ebay domain, balanced and SE outputs, sounds great. I have one that I use.

RE: Lampizator, I've been following Lampizator or in other words Lukaz's archive of projects since he started his old website many moons ago in the days where he would hack up various CD players and improve them by adding various tube output stages tapped from internal DAC IC's. When he migrated his old site to the new company he started called Lampizator when he use to sell on ebay and also sell Lampizator L1-L3 dac's as kits, the L4 builds he sold were never 100% consistent or the same. He basically used other peoples DAC boards, buffalo32 and various other ESS Sabre dac boards for his builds which he sold to other people. The only thing that made a Lampzator DAC a Lampizator is the tube output stage, nothing more.

I've also seen and heard over 16 various Lampizator L4 of gen 1- gen 4 and while he has improved his internal build styles and layouts over time it is not a professionally built product and certainly does not warrant what he charges on them. When I heard the L4 roughly a year after it came out, I liked it but the absolute garbage build inside put me off from ever buying one.

Lukaz is a great guy to talk to, certainly goes outside of the box of thinking for some of his designs but his more of a diy'er than a professional manufacturer. 

His early days motto (pre-Lampizator) was simply to build and improve on digital designs from big manufacturers and have it sound great without ripping off designs from another brand or over charging for something that is potentially a piece of shit. Now that Lampizator has become so successful he is doing the opposite of what he was against at first, using other peoples designs/boards and overcharging people with his products, I mean we are not talking about a few thousand dollar dac, his shit is $10k onwards nowadays. 

He claims to use good quality components internally but he doesn't, if you look at the picture that Kevin posted above the red film caps called Audiophiler, those are cheap Chinese generic film capacitors that you can buy on ebay for a few $$$ : http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/i.html?_odkw=audiophiler+mjp&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313.TR1.TRC0.A0.H0.Xaudiophiler+mkp.TRS0&_nkw=audiophiler+mkp&_sacat=0.

I would've been more impressed if he used a beefed up Broskie cathode follower as a tube output stage than his typical SRPP and other half arsed THD 10% + designs. 

Edited December 12, 2016 by DefQon

[spritzer]

14 hours ago, lostinaudio said:

You heard the Golden Gate? Thought not...

I think you may find the Big 7 and GG has or is using the Soekris board for PCM. The GG sounds much better on DSD (PCM up sampled). On PCM it is 'normal' or average for a good R-2R.

No I have not as I'm not retarded enough to think that this could be good.  DHT's as output tubes in a DAC?  Since when was 10% THD in the source a good idea?  I could also pose a question to you, have you heard anything that is properly designed and doesn't sound like ass? 

[kevin gilmore]

found this gem on lampizator website

•DHT triodes in single ended anode follower configuration as Lampizator signal tubes (45 or 2A3 or 101D)

really? i did not know that tubes worked that way. And something he does not say for the SE units, they invert phase.

for the calculated power and voltage levels depending on the tube, 5% thd second harmonic.

275V top of plate resistors, 130V on the plate, 55 volts on the cathode.  Not a lot of room to work with with this gain.

Edited December 12, 2016 by kevin gilmore

[RudeWolf]

On 12/8/2016 at 7:38 PM, spritzer said:

Ahh Lessloss...kings of snake oil.  Best be avoided like the plague....

There's a Soekris module inside there, so it might sound good. If they have bothered to change the digital filters and modded the PSU loading so it doesn't kill your downstream stuff on powerdown...

*shakes fist at Birgir for ninja-ing those two boards*

Edited December 15, 2016 by RudeWolf

[mypasswordis]

Hehe, I would have bought them just to play around with but already used up my audio funds. Guess the in thing now is to buy some $300 Soekris modules, put in a tube output stage and charge $10k+. Interested to read Birgir's impressions. 

[spritzer]

They are going to Kevin to play with but yeah, a DAC will be built at some point.   

[Sechtdamon]

Shit, Birgir bought the soekris modules on sale? Interesting things are going to happen indeed.

But I'm also wondering about how is hibiki (can be seen here) module compared to soekris module?

[kevin gilmore]

that one might be really good, real and matched cmos switches instead of digital outputs. But its pcm only, the cmos switches are not fast enough for dsd

[Sechtdamon]

Dr. Gilmore, you'll try very interesting things with soekris modules, I'm sure about that. And the dac you approved, Holo Spring also have dsd support. So, If that hibiki module with cmos switches can be better than others for PCM only, maybe "Old minded" ones, including me, can do things with it.

 

Also Dr. Gilmore, I posted before, but, what do you think about this dac:

 

 

 

It's price is 3k Dollars. OP has it's link. Internals look extremely neat I'm really trying hard to not to buy it.

Edited December 15, 2016 by Sechtdamon

[kevin gilmore]

not high enough resolution to see what is going on. like whether its sign magnitude etc.

and the power supply box obviously does not have enough capacitors.  This is overly goofy. Especially if one cap shorts out, repair could be just about impossible.

[Sechtdamon]

Thanks a lot Dr. Gilmore. You spare me from spending 3k. Well I'm waiting for your dac then. Or That Holo Spring. That 3k most probably ends up in Birgir's Pocket.

 

 

[blubliss]

Had the Holo Spring on loan for the last week.  It is quite good but I think the Yggdrasil is slightly better.

[DefQon]

I'd hate to service that Holo dac should something fuck up or that array of capacitors go out of tolerance or short out for whatever reason.

[RudeWolf]

Anyhow - if someone wants to get a good taste of that multibit goodness, get the soekris board. Some come up cheap 2nd hand, just make sure that you out-ninja other folks who might also get their multibit sweetooth on.

I got mine right after they became available. At first it sucked ass and was borderline a disaster. The guy who designed them is pretty experienced in digital electronics, but not so much in analog, so there were fuckups. And by fuckups I mean a few guys got their stuff blown up because of asymmetrical PSU loading which spat out an uber nasty DC transient on powerdown. Also initially digital filters sucked, so they had to be swapped out. Same for Vref capacitance, which used to be lacking.

Supposedly that's been sorted for rev4, so if you're up for it, get a half decent +/-12V DC PSU and try to find a good input board from my compatriot Normunds at DIYA. Some folks say that, if done right the DAM can trade punches with Yggy and come out on top. In the leaner implementations it's still one of the best diy DAC options out there.

However, if you hate hassle/adventure, just get the Modi Multibit. I think that it's a much better option than half of the old multibit big iron DACs out there.

P.S. Should any of you need info about working with Soekris boards, drop me a pm. I've gone through DIYA threads, so you don't have to.

P.P.S. I killed my board by lifting one of the Vref cap pads.

[kevin gilmore]

that picture is not the holo dac. its something else. the holo dac has only a few caps.

[joehpj]

The picture is Denafrips DAC-1 PRO

link here: https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?spm=a1z10.1-c.w4004-8327544200.2.yvBVss&id=520399273447

I read from a Chinese forum Hibiki sounds like TDA1541 while comparing to DAM1021 sounds like PCM1704. The Hibiki seemed to have some resolution problem.Of course this doesn't really make much sense because DA chip itself often doesn't have strong sound character. Maybe it's implying if the circuit was fine in the design, then maybe digital filter was not that good.

[Sechtdamon]

6 hours ago, RudeWolf said:

Anyhow - if someone wants to get a good taste of that multibit goodness, get the soekris board. Some come up cheap 2nd hand, just make sure that you out-ninja other folks who might also get their multibit sweetooth on.

I got mine right after they became available. At first it sucked ass and was borderline a disaster. The guy who designed them is pretty experienced in digital electronics, but not so much in analog, so there were fuckups. And by fuckups I mean a few guys got their stuff blown up because of asymmetrical PSU loading which spat out an uber nasty DC transient on powerdown. Also initially digital filters sucked, so they had to be swapped out. Same for Vref capacitance, which used to be lacking.

Supposedly that's been sorted for rev4, so if you're up for it, get a half decent +/-12V DC PSU and try to find a good input board from my compatriot Normunds at DIYA. Some folks say that, if done right the DAM can trade punches with Yggy and come out on top. In the leaner implementations it's still one of the best diy DAC options out there.

However, if you hate hassle/adventure, just get the Modi Multibit. I think that it's a much better option than half of the old multibit big iron DACs out there.

P.S. Should any of you need info about working with Soekris boards, drop me a pm. I've gone through DIYA threads, so you don't have to.

P.P.S. I killed my board by lifting one of the Vref cap pads.

Thank you sir, I'm on a hunt now. I'll drop you a pm about input board too. Can you say how much a decent system might costs? With all the boards required? I can arrange chasis, I guess.

[RudeWolf]

You can try this - http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/swap-meet/299822-fs-soekris-dam1021-rev1-0-02-bc550-mod.html

These are the earlier boards, but seem properly modded. As for the input board - I might actually be able to sell you one together with an Amanero USB->I2S converter. It will have on board connection for volume, input switching and input indication.

Ideally you'd want an extra 12V DC power supply because that supposedly improves the noise floor/sound. For a leaner build I could also ship you a proper 7VA transformer to use with the DAC.

Here's one of the last images of my DAC still in operation. You can see the input/control board.

[Sechtdamon]

15 minutes ago, RudeWolf said:

These are the earlier boards, but seem properly modded. As for the input board - I might actually be able to sell you one together with an Amanero USB->I2S converter. It will have on board connection for volume, input switching and input indication.

Ideally you'd want an extra 12V DC power supply because that supposedly improves the noise floor/sound. For a leaner build I could also ship you a proper 7VA transformer to use with the DAC.

Thanks for helping sir. I'll let you know when I can start this project. Btw, can you upload the pic to directly here? Our fucked up government banned imgur too.

[mypasswordis]

Speaking of TDA1541A, anyone want to share experiences with them? Particularly DACs with single and double crown units. The prices are insane!

Funny how audiophiles at the start of digital kept saying digital sounded worse than analog ("digititis" and whatnot) and ever since, audio companies use that as a selling point ("my design sounds more like real analog than all the other audio companies trying to make stuff that sounds like real analog!"). 30 years later, people are saying the old DAC chips sound like analog and the new ones don't. 

[RudeWolf]

6 hours ago, Sechtdamon said:

Thanks for helping sir. I'll let you know when I can start this project. Btw, can you upload the pic to directly here? Our fucked up government banned imgur too.

 

Edited December 16, 2016 by RudeWolf

[Dusty Chalk]

6 hours ago, Sechtdamon said:

 Our fucked up government banned imgur too.

[jp11801]

On 12/15/2016 at 6:51 PM, blubliss said:

Had the Holo Spring on loan for the last week.  It is quite good but I think the Yggdrasil is slightly better.

Did you listen to the Holo from I2S just out of curiousity? I was thinking of heading over to the dac shootout in DC on Sunday. They are pitting the holo against the yggy and the codex. 

[blubliss]

2 hours ago, jp11801 said:

Did you listen to the Holo from I2S just out of curiousity? I was thinking of heading over to the dac shootout in DC on Sunday. They are pitting the holo against the yggy and the codex. 

Yes, it was via i2s from my Sonore Signature Rendu, very nice streamer with no USB involved.  The Holo may be a bit sweeter but that costs some detail and soundstage.  I will say they are very close if volume matched, which is difficult since the output (vrms?) from the XLRs of the Holo and Yggy is different.  I didn't try DSD and only listened in NOS mode. The Yggy was hooked up to the same source via spdif and i had a nice switch to go between the Holo and Yggy, only trouble was volume matching.  

I would most likely choose the Yggy between the two, especially since it's American made.  The Holo is worth a listen.

Would love to hear what you think numbers.