My next DAC; what will beat out an Oppo Modwright 205?

[Zaheer]

Hello
The Belcanto black : overpriced in my opinion , and the after sales is simply PURE CRAP
If you are going for the MSB , DCS should be considered as well as CHORD Dave
Cheers

 

[rbbert]

You may call me crazy, but I still think the Bryston BDA3 is the one of the best and most feature rich DACs on the market. At 3500 it’s a steal. I wish I still had mine.

And it has HDMI inputs, so will accept DSD from the Oppo as an SACD transport (for 2-channel only)

 

[rbbert]

All very good thing to consider. Yes , I do plan on tube rolling in the 205 before purchasing another dac...I was just looking for more micro detail and a faster prat. Something that favors a solid state design. Thus my original post but , I’m VERY happy with my MW 205. It does it all a Roon, Mqa etc ..

There are some pretty amazing NOS 6922 tubes out there, almost make the 205 sound like a totally different device compared to the stock tubes. Replacing the rectifier will make a pretty substantial improvement as well (and is much less expensive than the signal tubes).

As yet, the 205 will not fully decode MQA from Tidal (only from an attached drive or disc), but among its 7 filter choices one can probably get fairly close to the intended MQA sound after Tidal does the "first unfold" (what a bunch of hooey)

 

[Randy Myers]

I would love to compare a PS Audio DirectStream, or even a DirectStream Junior. I believe that my Wyred 4 Sound DAC-2v2SE is a pretty amazing sounding DAC (many reviewers agree) but I am enthralled by the PS Audio emphasis on DSD. I absolutely love DSD. I do not care about the transport on my Oppo 105. I hear it is supposed to be good, but I archive all of my SACDs to my music server anyway (which the 105 is so very good at), so I never play them in the transport any more.

 

[TommyC]

The 203/205 as a transport doesn’t sound very good.

If you want to go the DAC route, try the 203 with a Vanity HD board. This board reclocks all incoming signal and reduces jitter. Plus, it can output DSD64 (including SACD) to a DoP capable DAC via spdif.

If you want to improve the performance further, get a LPS for the 203.

I have my 203 modded with Vanity HD, LPS, IEC, and solid core wire. As a transport, it is very close to the Nagra CDC. DAC is Nagra Classic DAC with battery MPS.

 

[skernes]

At the time I demoed the DS/Memory Player combo it was running Huron. I was playing physical CD/SACD via the transport and had numerous issues with dropouts(popping sound). I guess it had to do with the is2 handshaking? Nevertheless; it was enough for me to pass on the product. I work in IT for a living and didn't feel like restarting and or troubleshooting my audio system. Given it's price I didn't find that acceptable. In addition, there were a few other nagging issues (mostly software) that may and probably will be resolved in time but; just me personally it left a bad taste in my mouth.

I had the same issues with Huron, though in my case it was when using the bridgeII as the source... considered returning the dac... but glad I didn’t, it’s been amazing with red cloud.


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[skernes]

I think it's kind of amazing that reasonable Audiophiles are basing their purchase decisions on the whims of Bob Stuart and the "braintrust" at Tidal. And yes I have listened to it on two different respected MQA compatible devices that i own as well as the Auralic interpretation and don't find it up to anywhere near the level of the reviewer driven hype. One of the parties' company just got bought out and the other is on the verge of bankruptcy.

Which one is on the verge of bankruptcy?

Is this referring to the noise about tidal having 6 months of cash left? If so... remember that they are a VC/pe backed company; Spotify, pandora, even uber and google were no different during their formative years.


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[skernes]

I have had the Oppo 83, 93, 103, and now 203. They all play DSD on an SACD disk. None, as you say, will output the DSD as a digital stream.

The 203 will output the Dsd data if you add the (aftermarket) vanityhd card.


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[ray92130]

Modwright Oppo 205 vs Oppo 203/Cambridge Audio CXUHD + Schiit Yggdrasil (analog 2)

Modwright does not modify the digital output; it only modifies the analog output of Oppo 205 (or 105). So it makes sense if you use the Oppo as a standalone CD/DVD player (feeding directly into a preamp), not as a transport. My personal experience: I called Oppo and was told that 203 rather than 205 would be a better choice if I wanted to use 203 only as a transport (to feed into Schiit Yggy DAC). The Oppo technical practically conceded that the Ygge was a better DAC than the built-in DAC of 205. So I purchased 203 (4K blu ray/DVD player). Out of curiosity, I also purchased Cambridge Audio CXUHD (4K blu ray transport only). The two machines look practically identical inside (the same DVD drive and circuit board with the same ID number) (Oppo OEMs CA in the same Chinese plant); the only difference is an additional analog circuit board with analog outputs in Oppo 203. However, CA unit sounds better than 203 fed into Yggy, so I returned 203. My question here to anyone with personal experience: does the Modwright Oppo 205 used as a CD/DVD player sound better than Oppo203/CA CXUHD fed into Yggy (or another similar DAC)? Unless you want to use the modified 205 (or 105) as a standalone player (without the use of a DAC), why bother to modify 205 if used as a player (with its internal DAC) if it is not better than 203 + Yggy (or another similar DAC). Very curious about firsthand experience.

 

[joeinid]

Welcome to the forum Ray, thank you so much for joining.

 

[jmusica]

I'm very happy with my DirectSteam Sr. The new OS (Snowmass) is a bit of an improvement on Redcloud imo, and I thought Redcloud sounded great.

Granted I haven't compared it to many of the newer generation DACs but I'd say my ear is attuned to a higher-end DAC having switched to the DS from an Audio Note DAC4 Limited, which was the best I'd heard at the time I bought that, 5 or 6 years ago.

I wouldn't mind comparing it to a MSB or TotalDac, but don't have a way to do that.

 

[Randy Myers]

Several months back I did a very similar search/research. One difference is that MQA was/is not important to me. I do not do online streaming and I do not support a companies who's stated goal is to put every other format out of existence.

I seriously considered the DirectStream, especially after talking with Ted Smith. I love DSD and Ted also does ... I then decided to try HQPlayer in conjunction with my Roon. Wow... simply wow.... this turned the tide to the other final candidate in my search. The T+A DAC 8 DSD ended up being the DAC I choose. All I can say is of every piece of gear I have purchased, borrowed, sold, etc., since jumping back into this crazy hobby, the one that has taken it's permanent (or long term ) place in my rack is the T+A...