Measurements and Review of Schiit Yggdrasil DAC

[watchnerd]

Well now they created a NEW yggy thread that ban measurement talk among other things. Just about the same as their Cable section where even the use of the term DBT is censored. Now all the fanboys can circle jerk on each other over the amazing sound of the jzzy without interruption.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/the...mpressions-thread-read-the-first-post.881737/

I think the DBT / ABX topic is banned site wide, except for one little forum where they allow objectivist discussions.

I know I got in mod warned several times for not following that rule.

 

[amirm]

Well, this is an interesting turn of event. Jude post in that thread in head-fi that I am nwavguy. When I post my response it says it is moderated! So I am going to post it here for people to see. It is very, very disappointing to see him go there.

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• This message is awaiting moderator approval, and is invisible to normal visitors.

jude said: ↑​

amirm, at this point, I'm strongly inclined to agree with Currawong -- I feel very confident that I'm once again dealing with nwavguy. Welcome...back?​

Your accusation is patently false and uncalled for. I have no idea who NWAVGUY is. I expect such accusations from members, but not owner of this forum. I have provided my full history to anyone who wants to read. I have always and on every forum used my real name. I don't post under aliases. And don't like anyone from the industry doing the same. This includes NWAVGUY, atomicbob or whoever. If you want people to take your technical and professional experience seriously, you need to post under your real credentials so that it can be fully examined by readers.​

​

In addition, I have disputed nwavguy's review and measurements of Behringer. https://audiosciencereview.com/foru...eview-and-measurements-behringer-uca222.2036/​

​

​

Furthermore, anyone with any technical background reading his contributions and mine see that we are very different people. He has much more hands on electronic design experience than I do for example. On the other hand, I have much more experience in other fields such as signal processing, acoustics, computer technology, etc. And of course on the business and industry side.​

​

Our writing styles are also wildly different. He actually knows how to write proper English!

​

I have made no personal accusations towards you Jude. Or anyone else. Yet you continue with those against me. And without foundation no less.​

​

You need to read my posts in sound science here and see how much I battle objectivists there, defending much of people here like to see happen. Your moderator there can attest to that:​

​

​

Furthermore, you have post your measurements and challenges to me in a thread that is inappropriate for it given the resentment from the regular readers of it. You should have post that in a new thread that was moderated and allowed for proper exchange of data to get to a consensus that members here and elsewhere could use.​

​

To that end, my sincere apologies to all the owners and readers of this thread. It is not an appropriate place for this kind of back and forth in general and in the specific regarding measurements. It is creating resentment among people who have a lot in common (love of music, high fidelity, etc.).​

​

Finally, I asked you to email me your project file for AP analyzer. That is what the membership is asking us to do, use common settings. The only way to assure that is to see what you have used so that I can replicate it here. You are refusing to do so. I hope members no longer ask me to work with you in this manner.​

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The above was triggered by me simply asking him to send me his Audio Precision Analyzer project file for the linearity measurement. He is refusing to do so.

 

[watchnerd]

It becomes the Schiit Kringla Kippa with Bifast USB module.

Aren't those Ikea products?

 

[Blumlein 88]

Aren't those Ikea products?

A slightly more correct translation, no I am not making it up, is

Schiit Kringla Kippa with Bifast Fraud USB module.

I think Ikea has better QC than Schiit.

 

[commtrd]

I'm not quite sure what your question is? The Hugo 2 was measured here and found to a excellent performer.
https://audiosciencereview.com/foru...hord-hugo-2-dac-and-headphone-amplifier.2349/

Question being IF I was going to [upgrade] the dac in assembling a reference type desktop setup, what might be the most cost-effective addition? I had thought I might purchase a Schiit Yggdrasil (have to admit the name still turns me off totally) but now thinking maybe a Chord DAVE or the new Hugo TT? Of course the DAVE is somewhat more expensive. Disclaimer: I do own several pieces of Schiit gear... =)
Anyway, that was the question: What dac would be just tits with the Mjolnir Audio Dynalo Mark2 amp? I really like the builder's low=key presentation and the instant I read the stuff on the website it just clicked. I can of course just utilize my current Hugo 2 set to line out and call it good. But I was thinking about the input impedance matching i.e. I was going to order the Audeze LCD4Z for the 15 ohm input impedance, but reading some awesome reviews of the LCD4 with 200 ohm Zin makes me wonder which way to go. And so on and so forth...

P.S. I did try a Ragnarok amp back in the day and it kept blowing fuses and the stepped attenuation was a pain in the a$$ IMHO. I sent it back to them to fix, got it back, it still blew fuses. Sent it back to get money back for good. Was not terribly impressed with that one at all... They implied I was doing something to make it blow fuses. Well uhmmm no I was not doing anything to it but plugging it into the wall receptacle like everything else that was working just fine. Oh well.

 

[commtrd]

Clarification: The load for the Ragnarok was a pair of LCD-3 (classic non-fazor) balanced. Source was the Gungnir dac. USB conditioning via Wyrd out of a windows 7 laptop USB. So nothing flaky going on with the load side. Just wanted to make that clear.

 

[amirm]

Question being IF I was going to [upgrade] the dac in assembling a reference type desktop setup, what might be the most cost-effective addition? I had thought I might purchase a Schiit Yggdrasil (have to admit the name still turns me off totally) but now thinking maybe a Chord DAVE or the new Hugo TT? Of course the DAVE is somewhat more expensive. Disclaimer: I do own several pieces of Schiit gear... =)

Based on what I have tested so far, the RME ADI-2 DAC at $999 is the best in class at less than half the cost of Yggdrasil. It far outperforms it in objective measurements. It also has tons of other features like programmable filters which allow you to EQ your headphones or speakers. It of course has an integrated headphone amp so you don't need to add one to it.

I expect the Chord DAC to also measure well but it is just too expensive for me to buy to test and I can't see spending the money on it.

 

[Thomas savage]

Well, this is an interesting turn of event. Jude post in that thread in head-fi that I am nwavguy. When I post my responde it says it is moderated! So I am going to post it here for people to see. It is very, very disappointing to see him go there.

------

• This message is awaiting moderator approval, and is invisible to normal visitors.

jude said: ↑​

amirm, at this point, I'm strongly inclined to agree with Currawong -- I feel very confident that I'm once again dealing with nwavguy. Welcome...back?​

Your accusation is patently false and uncalled for. I have no idea who NWAVGUY is. I expect such accusations from members, but not owner of this forum. I have provided my full history to anyone who wants to read. I have always and on every forum used my real name. I don't post under aliases. And don't like anyone from the industry doing the same. This includes NWAVGUY, atomicbob or whoever. If you want people to take your technical and professional experience seriously, you need to post under your real credentials so that it can be fully examined by readers.​

​

In addition, I have disputed nwavguy's review and measurements of Behringer. https://audiosciencereview.com/foru...eview-and-measurements-behringer-uca222.2036/​

​

​

Furthermore, anyone with any technical background reading his contributions and mine see that we are very different people. He has much more hands on electronic design experience than I do for example. On the other hand, I have much more experience in other fields such as signal processing, acoustics, computer technology, etc. And of course on the business and industry side.​

​

Our writing styles are also wildly different. He actually knows how to write proper English!

​

I have made no personal accusations towards you Jude. Or anyone else. Yet you continue with those against me. And without foundation no less.​

​

You need to read my posts in sound science here and see how much I battle objectivists there, defending much of people here like to see happen. Your moderator there can attest to that:​

​

​

Furthermore, you have post your measurements and challenges to me in a thread that is inappropriate for it given the resentment from the regular readers of it. You should have post that in a new thread that was moderated and allowed for proper exchange of data to get to a consensus that members here and elsewhere could use.​

​

To that end, my sincere apologies to all the owners and readers of this thread. It is not an appropriate place for this kind of back and forth in general and in the specific regarding measurements. It is creating resentment among people who have a lot in common (love of music, high fidelity, etc.).​

​

Finally, I asked you to email me your project file for AP analyzer. That is what the membership is asking us to do, use common settings. The only way to assure that is to see what you have used so that I can replicate it here. You are refusing to do so. I hope members no longer ask me to work with you in this manner.​

-----

The above was triggered by me simply asking him to send me his Audio Precision Analyzer project file for the linearity measurement. He is refusing to do so.

All rather ridiculous but not surprising unfortunately.

They are hardly going to validate you in the eyes of their membership and customers by cooperating with your procedures wrt the AP project file. Maybe there’s foul play afoot and they are hiding it but probably just plain old bloody mindedness.

Your the enemy, all we can do is double down on our transparency and integrity and let people make up their own minds.

 

[Ron Texas]

I have been reading the instrumented tests on this site for a while, but decided to register today because this discussion is just too good to pass up. It makes me wonder if some designers are introducing intentional distortions in an effort to create euphonic colorations. The controversy is all the more interesting as the Yaggi received so many glowing reviews from professional (paid) reviewers. Are they ISO certain euphonic colorations or is this a case of the emperor's new clothes? Perhaps they should be listening to needle drops.

 

[amirm]

Welcome to the forum Ron. To answer your question, no, I think this is pure poor engineering. Analog Devices who makes that R2R DAC specifically insist that it not be used for dynamic signals such as we see in audio DACs. Here is Analog Devices Engineers telling people that this DAC will NOT produce excellent performance in audio applications: https://ez.analog.com/message/56859

Analog devices answer:

100 db is just over 16 bits by the way.

Here they are even more clearly dissuading people from using it for audio: https://ez.analog.com/message/72561

My measurements of actual product from Schiit follow these (so the claim that they worked around these is not correct).

None of these errors are euphonic. They are in-built accuracy errors that cannot be considered a good thing. Low-level detail is not preserved.

Now, it turns out that hearing small aberrations is hard. What is not hard is being pre-biased by Schiit marketing, shiny new box at over $2,000 and gushing about how good it "sounds."

I listened to this DAC for a few hours on two occasions. There is nothing euphonic about its sound. As with most DACs, what you hear is the fidelity of the source content, not the DAC itself. The praise for its fidelity is due to improper subjective testing, not because there is some magic in there that adds good sounding distortion.

 

[Blumlein 88]

I have been reading the instrumented tests on this site for a while, but decided to register today because this discussion is just too good to pass up. It makes me wonder if some designers are introducing intentional distortions in an effort to create euphonic colorations. The controversy is all the more interesting as the Yaggi received so many glowing reviews from professional (paid) reviewers. Are they ISO certain euphonic colorations or is this a case of the emperor's new clothes? Perhaps they should be listening to needle drops.

It at least could be possible euphonic distortions are a design decision. I don't think so in the case of Schiit as too often it simply looks like poor design. I suppose it could be a combination of both. (I see just now Amir has responded, and thinks it poor design)

Once devices reach transparency, something that sounds different is distorted. Yet it may be a distortion some people like, it could be people hear a difference and by marketing telling them it is better believe it an improvement or it could be people influenced by marketing not hearing anything at all.

 

[Ron Texas]

If the colorations are not euphonic, that leaves the emperor's clothes as the explanation. Arnim, thank you for the insight from Analog Devices. It confuses and amuses me that anyone would go to a lot of trouble and extra expense to build something like the Yaggi when there are inexpensive devices which measure without discrepancies.

 

[Cankin]

Ironically, the O2 headphone amp attempts to destroy headphones too when batteries discharge.

I have also read about this from here: https://www.neurochrome.com/o2-headphone-amp/#Battery

I am in the process of getting an amp, anything else I should consider in the price range?

 

[gvl]

The O2 is quite decent IMO for what it is if you don't plan to run on batteries.

 

[Blumlein 88]

If the colorations are not euphonic, that leaves the emperor's clothes as the explanation. Arnim, thank you for the insight from Analog Devices. It confuses and amuses me that anyone would go to a lot of trouble and extra expense to build something like the Yaggi when there are inexpensive devices which measure without discrepancies.

Well you can market it as multi-bit not sigma delta.

You can market it as clever, we used a mil-grade DAC and are so smart we can use it for audio even though the maker says not to do so.

Yes, if you back off and think about it these aren't really great ideas. But handled properly it obviously is a tremendous idea as they have a dedicated fan following and accolades from owners of the resulting device. Though said device has some issues at great expense vs less expensive better performing DACs off the shelf.

 

[Timbo2]

The O2 is quite decent IMO for what it is if you don't plan to run on batteries.

The power shutoff circuit is a crap shoot on the O2. Mine works as designed and properly shuts off with no hysteresis. I’d argue it is a weak point if the design. It I certainly testable and I don’t think it will damage your headphones if it only turns off and a on briefly while you test it. It will be interesting to see if after the batteries age it still properly shuts down.

 

[Ron Texas]

You can market it as Schiit... Those guys probably laugh their heads off every day they go to work.

 

[garbulky]

Very interesting regarding the reccomendations against analog audio. Schiit was pretty open about this. The manufacturer does not reccomend this dac to be used for analog operation. Schiit mentioned the issue was dealing with glitching. According to them they did. The designer of the AD DAC actually posted on their thread asking them about this. If you look at Jude's balanced linearity measurements you'd note that it does do better than 16 bit (117db , 122 db on the other channel)) even if you keep it to about a 1 db swing.

 

[gvl]

... It I certainly testable and I don’t think it will damage your headphones if it only turns off and a on briefly while you test it...

It almost damaged my hearing, that was enough.

 

[Timbo2]

It almost damaged my hearing, that was enough.

Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind. Reminds me of the time I was trying various android player apps on my cell phone and one of them decided to default to 100% volume. I couldn’t rip the earbuds out fast enough.