DirectStream DAC MKII Released

[bruce-in-philly]

OK, when are you releasing the next software update?

Peace
Bruce in Philly

[mark-d]

Years ago I owned the Wadia 861se and sent it to Steve Huntley to be upgraded by his company GNSC…to the top of the line Statement level mod. He was the-man to do any type of an Wadia upgrade!
When I traded it in… I took a big hit on it…even though Steve had Wadia’s blessings on all of his work upgrading Wadia kit.
From that I learned that even from an outstanding component upgrade company (let alone a hobbyist)…don’t expect any return on the investment!

[weedeewop]

The return being your enjoyment of the upgrade sans financial benefit upon resale.

[mark-d]

Exactly!!!

[john2213]

I would be much more likely to purchase a mod-ed piece if I knew the “provenance” of it and who did the work. For example, from a member here with posts and photos then from a “random” individual on a sales site

Best,
-JP

[weedeewop]

Same holds for many potential buyers modified units or not. Confidence in the item’s provenance is critically important. My current preference is NIB at a negotiated price fair to seller and buyer, sans modification.

[tedsmith]

@kzk

Another way of asking: when mk1 was released were you also not sure what the steps forward would be and they came to you later, or did you at that time have things in your back pocket you knew would be implemented?

During the life of the Mk I I never knew if I could find something to improve the sound beyond the next release. I almost always had a vague idea of things I might work on next. I never expected that I’d have so many releases with (arguably) bigger differences as the releases went along.

I tried to close the window on the biggest source of improvements I found in the Mk I - jittter and noise generation in the FPGA. But I have no idea if there will be something new that has a lot of room for improvements.

The FPGA in the DS was almost always “full”. At times it took four or more hours for each FPGA compile. But as time went on, I rewrote things over and over to find space to work. With the Mk II I’m currently using about 1/2 of the first FPGA so I have lots of room to expand and it only takes about two minutes for an FPGA compile.

[kzk]

@tedsmith

With the Mk II I’m currently using about 1/2 of the first FPGA so I have lots of room to expand and it only takes about two minutes for an FPGA compile.

Great place to be at launch, real-estate-wise

[weedeewop]

A solid foundation for a long lived Mk II. FPGA to spare so to speak.

[falling_leaves]

Hi Ted,

With the available space for the Mk2 do you think we can get a couple filter options, maybe modeled after a few filter that HQPlayer offers? What kind of filter is being used now for the DSD up-sampling?

Thanks, excited to hear beta feedbacks

[tony22]

Hey, if we’re voting , my vote is for an ability to accept room correction convolution filters!

[tedsmith]

I use a windowed sync, otherwise known as a linear phase brickwall filter. I have an extremely steep cutoff to preserve as much of the incoming frequency response as possible while still keeping the phase relationships of the incoming data - i.e. I want to preserve the wave shape of the incoming data.

Filters cost a lot of memory. If I put extra filters in now, I would be stuck with supporting them down the road. Then when I need more memory for better algorithms or better filters, I wouldn’t have it. Also I don’t want to be in the position of having to improve multiple filter’s sound quality with each release, especially if a given release breaks someone’s favorite filter, or if a release improves some filters but messes with others.

I want to have a simple goal of increasing fidelity on each release. I don’t want to take time patching filters that already objectively decrease fidelity.

[stevensegal]

@vkennedy61

magnum opus.

Giant Irish cat?

[vkennedy61]

@Elk

What remains to be seen is whether the marketplace as a whole will see the modded units as a pro, a con, or of no consequence.

A device this old, with a replacement item available is going to have very little appeal on the marketplace modded or unmodded. No warranty, no future upgrades. It’s a dead-end. The sales sites are littered with old DAC’s. Sure there will be some successful sales once the price is $1000 USD or less, but I predict resale at the volume of available units that will be hitting the market will be abysmal.

Either sell now and sell low, or trade-in. If you wait to do an open market sale on your own once the trade-ins start hitting sites like The Music Room, you are going to be competing with a lot of others.

[Elk]

In other words, modded units will go for no more than stock.

[sixpack1]

Cannot wait for my Directstream Mk II to arrive. It is a special privlidge to be part of the Beta testing. I hope I can provide some helpful insight for the creators. Thanks for having me!

[weedeewop]

With sixpack1 that makes three that have generously offered to share their experience on this thread. Congratulations to sixpack1 who will most certainly enjoy the trip, so to speak. @sixpack1 may wish to share their system as a reference for those who frequent this thread as have the other two Beta testers who have also gone public. Since we have three beta testers announced I am considering listing them in the lead-in post to this thread with their associated systems, if all are in agreement.
Regardless, once again sixpack1, congratulations and thank-you for sharing with the PSA community.

[mark-d]

Maybe also change the header from released to soon to be available or something like that…

[weedeewop]

It stays as it anticipates the event.

[mark-d]

Ok…it’s your post.