A few hours with the M7's

Mike said:
I’ve heard the Wadax more than a few times. I’ll happily take my Cascade/PF combo over it because my baseline for digital isn’t other digital, but tape. So many people run around proclaiming digital this and digital that with no frame of reference. Without a frame of reference for great sound, you’re lost.

The MSB to me sounds most like R2R tape. To my ears, dcs and Wadax sound digital. But Wadax is slightly better than Dcs in my experience. But MSB tops them all by a wide margin IMHO, even the entry level Discrete with the second PSU is just crazy good . Berkeley is good, but nobody calls for it. When we try to pitch it to people, they all bemoan the lack of DSD as if they have thousands of DSD tracks, but may not have any! The gap for me greatly widen between other DAC’s and the MSB when I added the PF Ultra and MSB/PF fiber card. But let’s be honest, at this level, they’re all excellent and it comes down to personal taste. I’ve had more than my share of top DAC’s come through the store on trade. Many were good, but none like the MSB IMO.

The Aqua LaScala is my go to recommendation under $10k. It has some wonderful qualities of the MSB (like being an R2R ladder DAC). Simple to roll a couple of the tubes and voila it goes up a notch or two.

If I wanted world class digital as a CD/SACD player, Esoteric is it. Add a clock and look out. It’s very very good. The new SE technology (Master Sound Discrete DAC) really catapulted Esoteric to a top spot IMO.

I’m curious about the new Lumin X2 as it seems they were listening to suggestions to try something different. The in-house discrete dac looks very good!
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Agree on the Esoteric and dCS , MSB vs Wadax not the same level is where we differ , never compared the two directly , so plenty variables, dCS is not in the same ball park for discussion IMO ..!

All Digital suffer from noise , digital ringing so to speak , very obvious at shows walk from room to room then enter any room playing analog, very obvious with a few exceptions , Lampi masks it well and Wadax has it the least for SS.

Analog is always the reference BTW regardless if TT or tape….

Tape has been one of my references ever since Peter Mcgarth demoed his ML system with master tapes for me back in 1979, i realized then he was cheating with his recordings :)

Always had decks and master tapes ever since , very good LP’s and a TT can be just as good BTW ..!

Digital brings something different to the mix, not using digital masters for compares since CD days , as this is the best way to compare to tape masters. In my studio involved days , we would have CD/DAT/Tape/acetate disc direct from tape masters to compare, Digital does not IMO , hold a candle to top analog , of course all system dependent/setup so im talking in absolute terms tested over years with many variables and analog was consistently the winner with few exceptions.,

regardless , Digital is really a near perfect medium for playback and storage and its here to stay, its all good i wouldn't want to be without either of them …!


Regards
 
brodricj said:
Nothing touches the Esoteric Grandioso N1T playing content from an attached SSD as a digital source....I haven't touched my Grandioso CD/SACD transport since the N1T landed in my YG rack. If you have an Esoteric digital source then putting it in the whole Esoteric ecosystem really leverages benefits. I was thinking about buying the new PS Audio PMG 512 wonder DAC but it looks like that is taking a predictable trajectory with the early adopters.
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brodricj, can you or anyone else comment on the N1T's featured 'Esoteric Network Engine G4' used in a network streaming environment?
 
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