thumbslapper
Member
- Joined
- Nov 9, 2018
- Messages
- 19
- Likes
- 10
all -
looking for a POD (plain old dac) around $100 and after spending a few days on this site (which i love for more scientific measurements and less comments like "I heard detail in the music I never heard before") seem to narrow it down to the Topping D30 and the new Schiit Modi 3.
I need spidf, optical and USB (will be switchign between hifi gear and computer). I'd love to have something with balanced outputs but dont see anything worthwhile <$500.
the DAC will go into a Allen & Heath 14 channel mixer which then goes into a pair of Focal CMS65's (which sound awesome, not sure why folks don't use pro-audio powered speakers more).
The reason i'm asking is the D30 seems to have been around for 2-3 years, and improvements in DACs seem to happen every year. I've gone thru the Schiit saga (which is actually what led me to this site, i always had a high opinion of them) but the Modi 3 seems pretty good.
While I"m at it here are a few other things I like about ASR:
- reviews of gear regardless of name brand or country of origin or if you buy them at a fancy audio store or on massdrop
- more measurements less personal bias
- reviewing of pro gear (RME) as well as stuff only found on ebay
I'm mainly a musician but have spent a good amount of time behind a recording console both recording and mixing, and I know how subjective listening is - ear fatigue, current mood, even emotions of people you are listening to the music with can change how you feel about a piece of gear, and I'm not even talking about speaker placement, standing waves, where you are in the room, ie non-subjective things.
This is for my home studio setup, so budget is of concern (we have Metric Halo convertors in the studio)
thx all!
-carl
looking for a POD (plain old dac) around $100 and after spending a few days on this site (which i love for more scientific measurements and less comments like "I heard detail in the music I never heard before") seem to narrow it down to the Topping D30 and the new Schiit Modi 3.
I need spidf, optical and USB (will be switchign between hifi gear and computer). I'd love to have something with balanced outputs but dont see anything worthwhile <$500.
the DAC will go into a Allen & Heath 14 channel mixer which then goes into a pair of Focal CMS65's (which sound awesome, not sure why folks don't use pro-audio powered speakers more).
The reason i'm asking is the D30 seems to have been around for 2-3 years, and improvements in DACs seem to happen every year. I've gone thru the Schiit saga (which is actually what led me to this site, i always had a high opinion of them) but the Modi 3 seems pretty good.
While I"m at it here are a few other things I like about ASR:
- reviews of gear regardless of name brand or country of origin or if you buy them at a fancy audio store or on massdrop
- more measurements less personal bias
- reviewing of pro gear (RME) as well as stuff only found on ebay
I'm mainly a musician but have spent a good amount of time behind a recording console both recording and mixing, and I know how subjective listening is - ear fatigue, current mood, even emotions of people you are listening to the music with can change how you feel about a piece of gear, and I'm not even talking about speaker placement, standing waves, where you are in the room, ie non-subjective things.
This is for my home studio setup, so budget is of concern (we have Metric Halo convertors in the studio)
thx all!
-carl