Esoteric migrating off of AKM Dac chips for flagship D1X?

Mike said:
I mean that the highs are much more prominent than the rest of the frequency spectrum. They don’t blend in with the rest of the spectrum, they attack you.

Highs are “forward” sounding - like turning up the treble 6 notches in the old days.

I completely understand why some people like “bite” in the high frequency. My friend Jerry loves bite because he’s lost so much of his upper/high frequency hearing. I would be shocked if he can hear above 10Khz. Maybe some designers are in the same situation.

I’m not there yet. :)
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Thanks Mike.

I'm not there yet either. :)

I do like "bite" in brass and sometimes solo strings, because that's how they can sound live, depending on manner of playing, acoustics of the venue and proximity to performers. But that bite is mostly in the (upper) midrange, less so in the treble.

Yet I certainly don't want a system to edit that out, I have a somewhat hard time with systems that sound too polite and inoffensive.
 
Al M. said:
I do like "bite" in brass and sometimes solo strings, because that's how they can sound live
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An excellent point - the "blat" of a trumpet or sax - is an important sound that should never be diminished in a reproduction system - it is essential to music itself.

Finding a DAC that performs the delicate balancing act between the clarity of brass "blat" while equally portraying the leading edge attack of a pick on an acoustic guitar E string followed by the note itself - the rich full sound reverberating though the guitar body whilst delivering the slightly "muffled" sound of a double bass (when played with the tips of fingers) is not easy - when you find one - you got a goodun.

I am with Mike on this one - I don't enjoy music where the reproduction sounds as if the treble has been enhanced - etched - dry.
 
Rob181 said:
Finding a DAC that performs the delicate balancing act between the clarity of brass "blat" while equally portraying the leading edge attack of a pick on an acoustic guitar E string followed by the note itself - the rich full sound reverberating though the guitar body whilst delivering the slightly "muffled" sound of a double bass (when played with the tips of fingers) is not easy - when you find one - you got a goodun.
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I like mine.

I am with Mike on this one - I don't enjoy music where the reproduction sounds as if the treble has been enhanced - etched - dry.
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Agreed.
 
brodricj said:
I see that AKM have a new DAC chip AK4499EQ with considerably better numbers than AK4497EQ.
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Wow, that must be brand new. It will be awhile before that chip makes it to Esoteric’s top components. To be honest, as great as those units sound, I’m happy to be off that merry-go-round. I love MSB’s modular design.

Ken
 
By the sound of it, Esoteric are doing their own thing in their top components, so my guess they're divorcing themselves from AKM chips.
 
brodricj said:
By the sound of it, Esoteric are doing their own thing in their top components, so my guess they're divorcing themselves from AKM chips.
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I think only on the D1X so far but I suppose that could change.

Ken
 
I'd love to drop a deposit on D1X, my N-01 sounds stunning tonight, to go something better is hard to believe....but I need to sell some surplus stuff first.
 
Mike said:
Just read two reviews on the EMM DA2. Soundstage and CA. CA puts it above the Berkeley and below the dCS Rossini. Both describe it with having lots of detail and resolute highs, but lacking the weight of even the dCS (which I don’t consider “weighty”).

To me, that’s EMM to a tee. Wouldn’t be my style. If someone likes things forward and hyper detailed, this is probably a good DAC. I prefer not to have my ears assaulted when I listen. I guess I prefer unamplified acoustic live or even tape and vinyl as good references for good digital.
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Mike said:
I mean that the highs are much more prominent than the rest of the frequency spectrum. They don’t blend in with the rest of the spectrum, they attack you.

Highs are “forward” sounding - like turning up the treble 6 notches in the old days.

I completely understand why some people like “bite” in the high frequency. My friend Jerry loves bite because he’s lost so much of his upper/high frequency hearing. I would be shocked if he can hear above 10Khz. Maybe some designers are in the same situation.

I’m not there yet. :)
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I'd encourage you to listen to the DA2. The DA2 is an entirely different beast than earlier Meitner products. My hearing (tested a couple of months ago and consistent with other tests over the years) shows above average high frequency. Against that background, I actually find the DA2 treble quite laid back, enough that I'm currently listening with the treble jumper in high position on my Focal Maestros.
 
Bar81 said:
I'd encourage you to listen to the DA2. The DA2 is an entirely different beast than earlier Meitner products. My hearing (tested a couple of months ago and consistent with other tests over the years) shows above average high frequency. Against that background, I actually find the DA2 treble quite laid back, enough that I'm currently listening with the treble jumper in high position on my Focal Maestros.
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Sure, I will give it a listen at the shows. But based on the reviews, I'm not sure it will be my cup of tea. We shall see. But frankly, if it doesn't even challenge the Rossini, it won't have a snowballs chance against a REF (for my ears).
 
Mike said:
Sure, I will give it a listen at the shows. But based on the reviews, I'm not sure it will be my cup of tea. We shall see. But frankly, if it doesn't even challenge the Rossini, it won't have a snowballs chance against a REF (for my ears).
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First, I'm not sure why you're treating a CA review as the Bible. They're as limited in their evaluations as most reviewers - would you take their word for it if they told you that the Select has less weight than the Rossini? A review is an extremely poor substitute for actual experience.

Second, saying you'll take a listen at shows is equivalent to not even trying. You're slamming a product you've never heard in comparison to a product you sell without even taking the time to actually listen to it in a system you know.
 
Bar81 said:
First, I'm not sure why you're treating a CA review as the Bible. They're as limited in their evaluations as most reviewers - would you take their word for it if they told you that the Select has less weight than the Rossini? A review is an extremely poor substitute for actual experience.

Second, saying you'll take a listen at shows is equivalent to not even trying. You're slamming a product you've never heard in comparison to a product you sell without even taking the time to actually listen to it in a system you know.
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I agree with you, CA is certainly not the Bible.

I’ve heard and owned many EMM/Meitner DAC’s. They all went out the door in short work. I have evaluated many products at shows quite successfully. A trained ear can do that my friend. If EMM wants to send it to me, I would be happy to listen to it and provide a critique, otherwise I will give it a listen at the shows. It might turn out to be excellent. Don’t know. Failing that, I will stick with what I like.
 
Mike said:
Well, he also thinks the TAD speakers sound good, so he sure loves that hyper detailed digital sound, so I’m not surprised.

I’ve heard or owned many Meitner/EMM DAC’s over the years. They’ve all been hyper detailed, impressive at first, then fatiguing after a while. Not my cup of tea.

I’ll prefer the likes of MSB, Luxman or the Chord combo.


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Without question hyper detailed and holographic sounding. The MSB is far warmer. It comes down to preference. Both are ridiculously good


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Let's take a Merry Christmas step back.

Hyper detailed is a nebulous term. If hyper detailed is being used to describe a DAC that when playing a live album allows you to hear hall ambience, crowd murmers, etc. in the context of a holistic musical performance akin to what I hear at a live show, then the DA2 is definitely that in my system. If hyper detailed is being used as a euphemism for tipped up treble, then that's not an accurate description of the DA2 in my experience.

If on the other hand we're talking about warmth, then the DA2 doesn't have that warm mushy record sound (my opinion of record sound of course). The crowd that was raised on records seems to want that sound out of digital. Personally, I can't stand it; if I wanted that sound, I would have bought a record player. That's not to say I want a cool sound, far from it, but the record sound is well beyond the warmth in any live performance I've heard and my hearing has tested as consistently above average (which just means that I'm hearing fine, not that my preference is the end all). For additional reference, while I love the D'Agostino M400 monos (one of the less than a handful of super hyped components that I've heard that actually lived up to the billing for me), when I paired them with the matching pre, to me the sound got syrupy and slow (my dealer disagreed but he grew up with records - I respect his preference but that's different than saying his view is the correct one).
 
You raise a very interesting point. I have to agree with you based on what I’ve seen. The younger audiophiles who grew up with CD’s, MP3’s, Hi Res digital and the like, seem to like a different sound from their digital. Much more detailed, what I would call “thinner”, or less “weighty” and certainly less organic (they would call it romantic) because their reference for organic is quite different.

For those of us who grew up on vinyl and R2R tape like myself, I think we seek out a different sound from our digital. I’ve had some younger audiophiles call it “too warm”, “syrupy”, etc. All fair comments from their experiences, but I just don’t hear it that way. I guess we all have a reference of what sound should sound like. Admittedly, mine is tape and vinyl.
 
Very interesting thread as I posted the review of the K-01xs vs DA2 on AA. I had lived with the DA2 for about 6-8 months and the thing it did the best was the holographic 3D sound stage without any doubt. I loved it. It also never sounded bright or hyped up in my system which consists of a Mark Levinson No52 Ref pre, No 536 Mono's, Wilson Sasha 2's, Aurender N100h, dac of choice, and all MIT Oracle IC and SC. Using all Transparent Ref and XL power cables w. Ref Isolator. To be fair ... when I started the comparison I was still using fairly cheap power cords and at that point the DA2 was better in almost every way and I had just about written the Esoteric off. Then, I decided to try better power cords and noticed that the entire system sounded much better. One night after getting the new power cords I decided to give the Esoteric another listen as I now had over 1000 hours on it. So with better power cords and equal HRS isolation platforms the k-01xs in my system did sound a bit better than the DA2. It achieved the same level of 3D sound stage as the DA2 with all of the detail but had more weight throughout the mids and lows with greater dynamic slam and impact which for me ... I like. By comparison the DA2 was now sounding a tad bit thin vs the Esoteric. I think that the Esoteric seemed to be more sensitive to power and vibration issues than the DA2 but once those were solved I really liked how it performed. To be very clear ... neither of these units ran all over the other ... the differences are small but noticeable and if I had never heard one or the other I could be happy with either. That said ... now that I've chosen the Esoteric I am going up to the game a little with the D-02X and if that sticks(who knows with me :-) ) then I'll swap out the K-01XS for the P-02X and call it a day. I had also compared the DA2 to the Vivaldi and I preferred the DA2 over the Vivaldi alone but when the upsampler was added I preferred the sound of the Vivaldi but just can't spend that kind of money right now. I liked the DA2 over the Rossini because to me the Rossini just didn't produce the same holographic sound stage as the DA2. I'm sure the MSB is incredible as well I just like the sound signature of the current crop of products from Esoteric. Totally personal preference here so I'm not saying any of these are "better" just different and I'm good with listening to what I like even if someone else thinks its not as good as something else! Moral of the story is to listen to these DACS in your system and decide what you like and make sure the test is truly apples to apples. Cheers everyone!

George
 
I left it alone on AA as you found a sound you were happy with (Esoteric's whole business model is based on overemphasis of the lower regions) but your comparison was as far from apples to apples as it gets. There were so many variables being mixed that it made my head spin. You don't know what in your system contributed to what part of the sound.
 
Bar81 said:
I left it alone on AA as you found a sound you were happy with (Esoteric's whole business model is based on overemphasis of the lower regions) but your comparison was as far from apples to apples as it gets. There were so many variables being mixed that it made my head spin. You don't know what in your system contributed to what part of the sound.
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I’ve owned an Esoteric K-01, K-01X and Grandioso K1/G1 and I never heard an overemphasis of the bass with any of these components. In fact, the overall frequency response was very linear. I listen to a lot of vocal/upright bass and piano/upright bass recordings and if the bass was overemphasized, it would immediately be evident.

Having read George’s posts here and on AA, it appears that he has done an exhaustive comparison over a long period of time of the K-01Xs and the DA2. Where he initially preferred the DA2, the K-01Xs showed a more significant improvement with upgraded power cords and interconnects. I have also found the Esoteric Players to be highly sensitive to cabling choices. So, in the end, he preferred the K-01Xs. This does not diminish the performance of the DA2, which he said was excellent.

Ken
 
You completely missed the point of my post. I couldn't care less what he preferred - that's for him to decide and be happy with. The issue I had is that he changed pre, amp, ICs, SCs, PCs and isolation all in the last year. That's basically a whole new system - it's impossible to make any apples to apples determinations with that much change.

Esoteric has always emphasized the lower registers, always have and always will - that's Esoteric's signature. Nothing wrong with liking that but that's a far cry from claiming a "very linear" (not sure what "very" adds - it's either linear or it's not) response.
 
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