For the record – never did the tape mod, though thought about it, and did a bit of the required homework.
It’s just sounding too good to mess with (more). Prost!
Given the huge improvement reported in the 1500 posts of this thread with those transformers and how cheap they are, I don’t understand why they were not approved in the original DS release. A conundrum.
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Perhaps @tedsmith can answer that one. I thought I heard there wasn’t enough supply for production issue.
Makes one wonder what else was left on the “cutting room floor” regarding the original design. Also, an indication of the tremendous sonic potential for the DSD mk II. I have a hunch one of the greatest challenges may not be the initial design of the mk II, but in addressing supply chain issues and the impact on the “locked down” mkII design. Coming out of beta testing next steps could be rather “challenging”. 
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The Stillpoints stuff gave a little more realness and a bit sharper transients in my perception.
No, it was more mundane. I designed the boards for both transformers, but the DS was already over budget by 50% which was very uncomfortable for Paul. When you are choosing the quality of a set of components ordered by price there will always be a component at the tipping point. I judged that the loss in sound quality that would result from trying to save money in other components instead of the transformer wasn’t a good tradeoff. I’d probably make the same choice again in the same circumstances. The DS was the result of downsizing my my very expensive and overdesigned prototype and I think I got a lot of the sound quality for a fraction of the cost.
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It’s also interesting how each exchanged part seems to need some degree of new voicing of the whole design. For me the transformer mod was not fully balanced without the PSU mod. For me it needed the faster, tighter, more dynamic influence of the external PSU to avoid a too relaxed and heavy sound of the bigger transformers (although their air/imaging advantage was immediately noticable). But the reason might be that I more dearly waited for the PSU effect anyway 
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I’d say so, every project wants to be gold plated, not that it necessarily needs it. It must meet market realities, thus compromise.
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I’d say there is a certain synergy and just throwing in after market parts may miss that opportunity. Knowing that the original design provided for either transformer made my design to pursue the upgrade easy. The circuit board has mounting holes for either transformer. Power supply upgrades, not so much. At some point one must trust the designer’s skill, expertise and experience.
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I think independent of pin compatibility one gets experience with the time, which mods work in which direction and it’s then possible to tweak towards ones goals.
Yes to a degree it becomes a personal thing based on preference. I find if iI tend to lean towards modifying an item I have had for a while it is most likely time to upgrade or replace it with something more in line with what I am trying to achieve.
Once the MK II is out, would you consider posting the original manifest of all the overdesigned components so that those who may want could pick up those components and swap them in?
I bet there are a few folks on this thread who would enjoy the opportunity to go down that path.
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I’m warming up my Hakko!
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I’ve recommended a set of simple mods multiple times. (Perhaps even multiple times in the DS Mod thread 
) I even made those recommendations within months of the DS being released (the XS4400 transformers among them.) It took a while before anyone got around to trying them.
The components that would make a big difference either draw a lot more power (e.g. twice a much for better video opamps) or have vastly different footprints (reclocker). Much of the other good stuff (like optional isolation on all inputs and outputs) is in the DS Mk II or the TSS. That’s not simply component swaps. The DS uses discrete regulators instead of chips so there’s nothing to do there. The resistors and caps in the audio path (and regulators) are much better than average so any difference will be small. Basically every component choice affects most of the others - the DS is designed as a whole for the most synergy.
The transformer and replacement analog power supply are the easiest and the most bang for the buck.
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Hakko off.
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Changing away from SMD is ill advised. The DS already uses Panasonic FK long life, low impedance caps. Many prefer them for audio… In any case the SMD aluminum electrolytic caps on the analog board don’t affect the sound much. There are two more levels of regulation beyond them with much better caps. And no electrolytic cap can be very low impedance at 22MHz which is the requirement on the DS’s clock, reclocker and digital switches.
“The DAC” ? There is no DAC chip on the analog board, the analog board is the DAC.
I’m not sure why someone who is modding would build a discrete PSU instead of buying a well designed low noise PSU that’s already available. 12V 1A is a simple spec. Beyond that getting as low noise and impedance is just a question of how much you want to spend.
There are no aluminum electrolytic caps on the digital board. Also replacing any ceramic caps with non surface mount caps is a really bad idea on the digital board. It will only add gobs of noise and perhaps will render it non functional.
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I think this depends on the expected relation of the performance increase and price level between the modded and the potential replacement unit.
Here anyone must take his own decision. Not everyone dares or wants to mod, not everyone wants to pay the price for a complete change of units or sees it in relation to the potential performance increase, others know that the performance step they’d want needs going further up (in performance and price), but they postpone that big step to later, others again can’t resist immediate changes as soon as a new component release comes out. There are so many (personal) right choices
In retrospect and with today’s experience I can say, I personally was too reluctant with real HW mods so far. It sure has to be done carfully, so that synergy isn’t jeopardized. And for sure the manufacturers units have great synergy and efficiency for the price. But observing how strongly those units are built to a price point, seeing the factor applied to parts and hearing the effect of a modification expense of few hundred $ which would have possibly meant few thousands in the original design, changed my mind to do a bit more elsewhere (not in the DS) in future. There are a lot of people preaching that all the time and it’s also correct to be very careful, but not completely pass on chances. In this case it’s nice to know now what can be expected from firmware changes and what from such HW changes in comparison and to get aware, which HW effort, one can apply by either replacing parts or choosing the best specialized external periphery, probably can’t be expected in even much more expensive units due to the parts cost influence.
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I guess you’ll have to live with what Ted pointed out already. Everything is said and every meaningful recommendation given. The various opinions of others are not Ted’s problem and cost cutting is done to any equipment on the market.
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I’m not trying to be obstructionist, nor am I arguing. I’m trying to have clear communication. But you can’t change parts that don’t exist.
There is only one version of the Directstream DAC. There was a previous DAC which was the PS Audio PerfectWave DAC, much of what you’ve mentioned could be relevant there. But it doesn’t have any analog output transformers so you can’t really get them mixed up.
Just like you are having problems understanding me, I had problems understanding you. I just didn’t want there to be more misunderstandings so I was careful to point out what I wasn’t understanding. There was no intent to judge or criticize.
You should never change SMD parts to thru hole without matching all of the parameters of the original part that the circuit relies on. Thru hole parts will often be more microphonic than surface mount parts and simple physics keeps them from having as low of ESL as the surface mount equivalent - this is especially important on the digital card since the self resonant frequency needs to be near 22MHz.
The FK and FM caps are built with the same electrolyte, the same geometry and specifications, one is surface mount the other is thru hole but otherwise they are identical. The taller FM thru hole caps inherently have a lower equivalent series resistance (about 1/2 of the FK SMD parts) which is good, but I chose the size of the FK caps to get the series resistance in the range I needed so lowering it past there isn’t terribly helpful in the DS. Anyway, as I said changing the aluminum electrolytic caps on the analog card won’t help much.
Shielding the display will help more than changing caps. There are plenty of people here who have followed my advice with shielding and have reported favorable results.
No, I’m not going to get in contact and discuss. I’m not trying to impugn his work, experience or integrity but I know my device, he doesn’t. But suggesting fixing things that aren’t there implies some sort of misunderstanding somewhere at the very least.
The XS4400 parts cost approximately the same for PS Audio as it does for you to buy them. I’m not sure if PS Audio negotiated a price reduction with Edcor, but for many of the expensive parts in the DS there isn’t much of a volume discount available (0 volume discount for the FPGA, for example.) There are incredible volume discounts available for the cheaper parts
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@ Ted
Maybe it’s been mentioned before.
But would it be an idea to make an SE version of the Directstream.
The SE version with uncompromising parts.
In the future the Directstream MKII and the MKII SE.
I’m so happy with my current upgraded DS.
Curious to what good be better in MKII.
Is there already a price tag for MKII?
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