Which dac amp upgrade would be the best

[Psittac]

13 hours ago, Fosh612 said:

I've heard great things about the vali 2+  thinking about grabbing that little tube amp. 

 

Schiit makes good stuff but I wouldn't make a tube your primary amplification due mainly to the warm up period and the wear on the tube, however this can be overcome if you really want it as a daily.  The vali offers the benefit of being able to drive lower ohm headphones due to the solid state aspect.  For higher impedance headphones I enjoy all tube because it's even more tubey.  For tube hybrid I enjoy my Xduoo MT-602 with the MT-604 being another option.  Then for all tube I love my Darkvoice 336se and little dot mkII.

 

13 hours ago, H713 said:

I've never been a huge fan of the Vali. It's a tube amp, but it's got a solid-state output driver and no transformers in the audio path. I also feel that their plate voltages are a little on the low side for the tubes being used - I'd like to see them a little bit higher for maximum linearity out of an ECC88.

 

IMO, tube amps are a lot of fun, but 50% of the tube sound comes from that lossy chunk of iron in the audio path. Of course, a tube amp that I'm happy with will be pretty big and pretty heavy. Unless you're the type who builds their own tube amps like me, something of this sort would also be pretty expensive. 

 

I have recently found out that my little dot mkII has a jumper to allow it to work on lower impedance headphones.  Is this something that will work on 32ohm headphones?  I have the MT-602 for my lower impedance but would like to hear my fidelio and zeus on all tube.  (I know these are all still faux tubes by your standard but I don't have the budget for the legit stuff)

[Fluph]

On 6/30/2022 at 9:31 PM, OfficialTechSpace said:

If you have the money, stick to dedicated solutions. Not just Amps with integrated DACs, but individual DACs and Amps. Unless you're on a tight budget (sub ~$150), that's a bad investment.

 

I've been out of the amp game for a while, but THX is still in the top percentile even years later (at least, at this price category). If you don't need balanced, the THX AAA ONE from Drop is a good, cheap offering. The SMSL SP200 is only marginally more, comes with an updated THX-888 chip, and balaced inputs/outputs.

 

If possible, I like to steer you clear of audiosciencereviews for measurements. They've recently had a spotlight shone on their immoral and technically inaccurate practices. I wouldn't trust them to use their own equipment properly, and GR Research made a very good point as to why. If necessary, I'll direct you to some other site.

Someone bought some expensive equipment that ASR measurements proved were mediocre didn’t they.