I have been quietly following this thread, finding other’s journey of interest and helpful. Several participants seem to be clear that reducing the PS Mk1 DAC volume to 92% rather than 100% is an improvement.
I think it only applies to the DSD Mk I. I have a Mk II and have had another PS Audio DAC and it did not apply.
Jack, I figured it was you. I like the Aqua La Voce S3 and have considered finding a used one. On the Aqua website, they no longer have the La Voce listed. I suspect that they are coming out with a new version. Did you get to hear the La Scala with the Linq? It makes a nice difference but it is crazy expensive for what it is.
By the way, some one told me that the Stellar Gold DAC sounds better than the DSD MKI. Have you heard the Stellar Gold?
My next DAC will be used for sure. I am going to half time work May 1 and then retire in 2 years or maybe 4 years since I lost $500,000 thanks to the Cheeto posing as president. And I expect to lose even more. I am 66 and may even have to work to age 70. I was planning on selling all my gear except my TT and phono preamp and buy an Ayon Tube integrated amp and a pair of Buchardt E50 speakers or their cheaper S400MKII. I may also end up keeping my Luxman DAC which still sounds excellent.
From what I could gather Christian stopped producing the La Voce S3 during Covid as the result of parts shortage and the La Scala was a higher margin product. I too thought their would be a new model or an S4 upgrade afterwards but it didn’t happen. There was a time when they could be found used but haven’t looked lately. Never heard a Link Q but for a time they were highly thought of. Have stayed in the Auralic streamer ecosystem since 2015 other than a brief venture into Lumin. I am using the G2.2 now and don’t anticipate changing for a while.
As to the Stellar Gold or it’s predecessor, to me just another ESS based DAC which are not my thing and have owned a couple. For Delta Sigma much prefer AKM but through the years have settled with FPGA or R to R based DAC’s. In the Delta Sigma arena there is an abundance of products at more attractive price points.
There is a clean La Voce S3 at a dealer in California on Audiogon now.
https://www.audiogon.com/listings/lisbdgf0-template-032666-full-range?refsource=hifishark
The passing of one of the greats, IMO, who was under appreciated by too many in the hobby and industry.
Thank you Lonson. Of course, I will listen and test it out myself, but you guided my listening expectation. By the way, as long as I am thanking you here, as a mostly quiet participant, I have appreciated your sane comments in many threads. Also appreciate that you changed pictures awhile back, so we get to appreciate your “cutie”. [Wait, is it wrong to innocently complement your wife these days? If so, …]
Paul McGowan | CEO800-PSAUDIO
Boulder, Colorado
There was an S3 on audiogon the other day. It was priced to0 high. I do not like ESS dacs either. I want a DAC to have some warmth and a little bit of bloom. It needs to have a tonally rich midrange and a smooth top end. It also needs to have a huge soundstage and it needs to be musical. My Luxman gives me that and more. However, it is a 2013 design and getting a little long in the tooth. Modern DAC’s have more detail and resolution now. When I bought it I looked at the original Hugo, W4S with the Femto clock upgrade (I found it to grainy sounding), the Original Auralic Vega which I found too thin sounding. I heard it in a $120,000 system. I looked at the Bryston BD1 and a few others. I did get to hear the DSD DAC in my system and loved it but I had already bought the Luxman direct from Japan which saved me $3K as it was selling for $6K back then. The Luxman has more warmth and musicality than the DSD DAC. I definitely like a colored sound but I also liked the air, transparency and space between instruments that the DSD DAC had.
Any way, I hope that the equalizer plug in fixes the bass problem. If it does my son will keep it and then upgrade the transformers.
Yes, Frank was a good guy. He did not design his gear anymore. He would design the layouts. Frank had a great ear for music. I enjoyed doing reviews for him and I still own a couple of pieces of his gear, a hybrid tube preamp and hybrid DAC. Mary, his manager and friend who took over the business wants me to continue doing reviews for the company. I also just developed a relationship with Boris from Vista Audio. He is sending me one of his desk top integrated amps to review.
PS Audio seems like a good company similar to AVA HiFi. Paul seems like a great guy and seems approachable which is fabulous. I met him at an audio show a few years back and I had a nice brief conversation with him. I don’t own any PS Audio gear right now. I did have a pair of M700’s but we had issues with ground loops that could not be figured out, so we had to return them. Too bad because they sounded better than the Parasound A21 that they were going to replace. We ended up with the Cary 300.2d integrated amp that sounded better than both.
I just found out that the DAC is the MKI version. There are numerous MKII’s for sale used for around $1600.
My question is, what is the difference in sound between the 2 dacs?
I very much doubt that there are Direcstream Mk 2s for sale at 1600. If it was running Windom or Snowmass it is a DSD Mk 1 (Sunlight is the best and latest firmware for the DirectStream Mk 1 (people didn’t call it a Mk 1 until the Mk 2 came about). The Mk 2 is much newer (about 2 or at most 3 years old).
Lowest price I found was $3700 but most are in the lower 4’s.
Well thanks for the kind words, and no I don’t think it’s wrong to compliment a wife, at least it’s not to compliment mine. I’m well aware how fortunate I am. We knew each other as friends (she dated one of my coworkers) in the late seventies and then didn’t meet again until 2014. We’ve been happy together ever since.
Yes Brian, I’ve got four of them, Mk 1s that is!
Sorry I replied to wrong message. Should have been to @Go_Yanks not yours.
Yes Brian, in fact one cause of confusion is that the DSD shares metalwork with the previous dac which could itself be updated with a kit to DSD status.
So I just checked the ad on ebay and the person has it listed as an MKII but the picture is an MKI. I sent him a message to change his ad.
To make things more confusing, you should know that the PerfectWave DAC from PS Audio had two iterations. The original PerfectWave DAC was upgradeable to the then new PS Audio DirectStream DAC, a/k/a the DirectStream Sr. DAC.
The original PerfectWave DAC case work was maintained and one would swap in the DS Sr. guts to get the latest and greatest from PS Audio and OEM DS Sr. DACs were manufactured using the same case work as the PerfectWave DAC.
The DS Sr. has come to be known as the DS MK I.
All this to say, I have noted some folks mistakenly referring to upgraded PerfectWave DACs as MK II’s.
FWIW.
Jack, I got to hear the Aqua Formula DAC at Mikes at Sun Coast Audio. I flew down there to hear the Fyne Audio 702 speakers that I was planning on buying. But Covid hit that month and buying a $10K pair of speakers were the least of my worries. I was trying not to get covid and die since I was seeing about 10 Covid patients a day and many that I admitted to the hospital died.
The Formula DAC was fabulous. Its too bad that Aqua is not making the La Voce. Now their budget DAC is the La Scala at $8K lol.
