I’ve recently sold my PSA DAC to help pay for my recently acquired “Forever Speakers” Klipsch Cornwall IV’s in Black Ash. It was not an easy decision and I will look for one (in black only) on the used market probably near the end of the year. I’ll be watching TMR & the Marketplace on the PSA Forums in the meantime.
So I needed a DAC to stream music from my Bluesound Node 2i (thx @umiami91). I’m not a fan of the ChiFi DAC’s and wanted something designed and preferably fab’d here in the U.S. That’s when I thought of the Orchard Audio dual mono PCM 1794 DAC. North of $300, you can’t go wrong. It revealed a problem that I have with the DAC I modified inside my Sony UBP-X1000ES. The highs are rolled off unless you seriously increase the gain. Getting an Orchard Audio unbal. to bal. assembled PCB this Summer (on back order currently).
The sound ? Well with CD’s it’s what everyone says out there in YouTube land & in various online Audio Magazines. Fed into my BAT VK50-SE back from the Factory ($1800 later - worth it though), it’s not to warm and definitely not fatiguing. Excellent Bass extension, smooth Mids, and the Treble just right thanks to the Tube Preamp. No. it’s not as good as the PSA DAC. SACD/DSD files sound pretty good too even though I have the Sony set to “Dumbsample” to 176.4kHz/24Bit PCM via the S/PDIF output into the Orchard DAC’s input.
Using Paul’s (well actually Stan’s) wisdom and grabbed 3A toroidal and added a switching regulator with a 1000uF Cap with a 5.6uF Solen Cap. All stuff I had in a junk bin of parts (except the regulators - Amazon). I bought a shipping damaged chassis from Leo @ Orchard Audio. Added a DPDT switch to select either the Sony’s S/PDIF or the Node 2i’s S/PDIF.
Quiet as a Church Mouse !
