I have a couple of Soekris dacs and an ancient but overbuilt in any respect ESS9018. All my dacs benefit from some form of fifo or reclocking, often combined. The 1862 as well.
Fwiw, i find the Soekris dacs intolerably dull with the NOS filter, much worse than the 1862.
The only digital filter i have at hand is a DF1704 and one of these days will try it out with the AD dac.
And please don't call me funny names
Damit the Soekris was the one that disapointed me the most despite profiting of a bench of better polymer cap at the rigth area. I sold it fastly after few months. And whatever the fifo, all the front ends mods could be heard. It was not a good dac according my expectations. I haven't heard the further iterrations though.
Btw is DF1704 better than PMD100 ?
Btw is DF1704 better than PMD100 ?
Not sure if this can be very productive as everyone's system and expectations differ.
Tonal balance is generally good, bass resolution and delineation is almost spectacular. Drums too. Strings otoh, especially violins leave me wanting.
Something that is present with other dacs and most definitely with analogue is lacking here. Playing higher than 44/48kHz bit rates does not really improve it and neither does software oversampling.
I should really connect a hardware oversampling filter, just for elimination purposes, and then look elsewhere for a culprit.
Btw, i only recall two attempts on this board to address NOS issues in the analogue domain:
sinx/x analogue filtering as discussed per example here https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/how-to-design-sinx-x-filter-for-tda1541a.6331/
and of course Abraxalito's amazing Zanden clone https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/dark-led-passive-filter-i-v-stage-for-nos-dacs.395208/
The idea of upconversion to high rate dsd is a little mystifying. Apparently some extremely clued in people support it, so it cannot be bunk.
But my personal experience with HQPlayer and a reasonably high end commercial dsd dac was not positive. Indeed, very smooth, maybe even too much.
According to knowledgeable people the 1704 is pretty bad, but i don't have a PMD100.
The Soekris took a lot of work and patience, horrid out of the box.
Appetite woken here... I'll have quite a read tonight!and of course Abraxalito's amazing Zanden clone https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/dark-led-passive-filter-i-v-stage-for-nos-dacs.395208/