Musical Fidelity MX-DAC Review (Balanced DAC)

[DSJR]

The "piglet" series was a design extravagance, maybe an attemt to attract buyers by different design (a piglet farm instead of a row of boxes)

musical fidelity x-series - Google Search

They were universally UK-popular back then (was it really twenty five years ago?) and as stand alone amps, the XAS 100 with XP100 was really good to hear music through. I loved the XA200 mono amps but the sound wasn't as 'atmospheric' into many speakers - I'd love to see what I was hearing here measured as there MUST be a tech reason! The X-Ray CD player was very competitive at the then price of £800 or so and the one which started it all, the X-10D valve line buffer, 'sexed up' ****** sounding CD63 KI CD players with early HDAM circuits inside and copious copper screws I did a 'Rock Grotto' update on my X-10D together with the Russian mil-spec valves he suggested and the 'sound' then became audibly benign with little to no insertion loss, so defeating it's supposed subjective purpose really as the objective impedance matching task wasn't really an issue I subsequently discovered.

 

[respice finem]

I've had the X-can for a week or so, borrowed for testing, wasn't bad, but I realized in comparison to studio stuff I also had access to at that time, that it sounded slightly "off", while pleasant.

 

[suttondesign]

I used to deal in Musical Fidelity and had a fairly expensive DAC that I kept on hand for headphone auditioning. However, it had a strangely "soft," fuzzy, or "veiled" quality that I found really odd. The mfr. didn't release any worthwhile specs. I had previously been using a Benchmark DAC as the demonstrator unit. I sold the Musical Fidelity off at a loss and dropped the line, feeling less than confident that the products were well engineered.

 

[PierreV]

I was curious about the misspelling of "cognac" so I checked the HFN original <https://www.hifinews.com/content/musical-fidelity-mx-dac-usb-dac-page-2> (Nov 2020). It says

The Very Thought Of You' is one of my all-time references, thanks to moody saxes, tinkly piano stage right, late-night drumming and King in full-on crooner mode. It's mellow, seductive and soothing – cognac for the ears. The MX-DAC did not disturb that mood.

So, it is spelled correctly, and the sentence refers more to the music that the DAC.

Yes, I checked before posting as well and that's why I said they distorted the review

Totally agree with your other comments. Epiphanies... just flowery garbage...

 

[Aperiodic]

Why are these flagship priced DAC's so poor in performance and engineered so poorly. Aside from Mola Mola Tambuiqui and Okto Dac8, i don't see any other flagship that can be justified for price and performance. Much deserved headless panther IMO.

A quote from the late Brian Cheney of VMPS Loudspeakers summed up this (and 'high-end in general) with the following statement: "The price is the product." A surprising cross-section of high-priced gear fails to meet baseline performance standards, let alone provide hi-end performance. Caveat emptor.

 

[MediumRare]

According to who? Influencers. Mmm. Let's define the whole "influencer" scene shall we? Who are they and how do they actually add value?

Sony wouldn't remotely give a chit.
Yamaha wouldn't care one iota. Tell me, what brand is bigger? Oh, Panasonic, and do they give a chit about this business?

And then we have the 'roll-ups' as I call them. The corporate umbrellas that have vacuumed-up previously iconic, loved, and respected brands. We can rattle them off but you get the picture.

ASR is wonderful, but without incontrovertible, extensive testing of gear, it will simply be another internet noise maker.

Based on our visitor traffic, plus what I’ve been told by multiple online retailers. I don’t understand your reaction.

 

[MediumRare]

It need to be impressed on ASR readers, (once again), that many reviewers and many audiophile listeners LIKE 2nd and 3rd order distortion -- they like components like the Musical Fidelity not despite but because of their relatively high distortion.

Please provide evidence for this, namely that an objective test found a group of people who consistently prefer distortion.

 

[AnalogSteph]

**) As of now I have no explanation for this effect. Below a comparison of an SMSL SD1955+ and an RME ADI-2 Pro FS R with the exact same settings and conditions for the measurement, using the analog bandpass. Test frequency was 725Hz to allow maximum clearance to both mains hum/buzz and the idle tones of the SMSL (coming from the charge-pump generating the negative opamp supply rail).

Note that at least for the RME the plot is noise-limited, partly induced by the setup (it gets a bit better with the steeper digital bandpass). For the RME I've found, in a more elaborate, not noise-limited measurement, that it does what any D/S-DAC is supposed to do: linearity 100% nailed down to bit 24!

-0.5 dB at -115 dBFS is about -139.5 dBFS, which is getting awfully close to the limits of 24 bits. Besides, we are talking multibit delta-sigma converters here, and those are trying hard to eliminate their converter nonlinearity but it may not be 100% perfect. If you look at the AD1955 datasheet, linearity curve TPC 12 even shows a minimal negative deviation if you look closely, and it's actually even worse at about -1 dB at -120 dBFS. In 2002 when this part came out, perfect low-level linearity still was not a given.

Do you remember back in the early 1980s when Philips was fighting against the Japanese CD player manufacturers? They printed leaflets, fact sheets and cards to show how their dodgy 14 bit D/A converters with O/S filters were as good as genuine 16 bit converters.* They weren't.

Converter nonlinearity notwithstanding (which, mind you, is quite the elephant in the room), 4X OS alone gets you to 15 bits effective, and the accompanying digital filter applies some noise shaping to boot, so effective 16 bit performance within the 20 kHz audio bandwidth is entirely feasible. A contemporary review of the Marantz CD73 linked here at some point stated an SNR of 98 dB.

 

[MediumRare]

Do you understand the term 'State of the Art' (SOTA)? ASR is about finding that.

If we are reduced to adding one more angel to the head of a pin then we will be irrelevant.

 

[tanglewire]

I disagree and you are wrong on what @amirm does. Almost always he doesn't "open the hood"?

You didn't understand Amir's analogy. I feel sorry for you... keep trying!

 

[Gorgonzola]

Please provide evidence for this, namely that an objective test found a group of people who consistently prefer distortion.

Do you doubt it? Have you had much discourse with subjectivist audiophiles and their likes & preferences? I have, and that's my conclusion.

I make no scientific claim. However scientific investigation is based on this sort of conjecture: feel free to do rigorous science to prove or disprove it. I'm not a scientist and do not have the training or means to undertake it myself.

 

[Madlop26]

Do you doubt it? Have you had much discourse with subjectivist audiophiles and their likes & preferences? I have, and that's my conclusion.

I make no scientific claim. However scientific investigation is based on this sort of conjecture: feel free to do rigorous science to prove or disprove it. I'm not a scientist and do not have the training or means to undertake it myself.

well... sorry to tell you, but without proper scientific data your conclusion worths nothing at all.

 

[MediumRare]

Do you doubt it? Have you had much discourse with subjectivist audiophiles and their likes & preferences? I have, and that's my conclusion.

I make no scientific claim. However scientific investigation is based on this sort of conjecture: feel free to do rigorous science to prove or disprove it. I'm not a scientist and do not have the training or means to undertake it myself.

Yes, I doubt it.
1. Unless it's well over 0.5%, all the research any of us have seen says it's not likely audible. So -70 dB (0.03%) in a decent tube amp? sorry, nobody can hear it.
2. Anecdotes without data are fun but irrelevant.
3. I like it in my (own) electric guitar, but not in my (recordings of) cymbals and especially not in my violin solos.

 

[shal]

wow. I just bought this . Should have done a bit more research.

Why are you sad?
You have now a good DAC with no audible difference with the better dac of these days.

I have bougth 2 years ago a Lavry DA11 ( first release : 2010 !!!)
No regret at all, i am confident that it sound as good as better DAC of these days and perhaps better with its sophisticated volume control .
And it is very well built (quality pro business oriented).

Ok if you have payed $1000 , there is a problem but not the choice the of this DAC himself .

 

[amirm]

@amirm I think you should at least start your review with the year in which the product was first available - in this case 2015.....

I am not an audio historian. Nor is this information always easy to find. I do look to see if a product is being sold currently and this one is. It also has a review as recent as 11 months ago:

10/20. If the company doesn't think it is too old to be sold or reviewed, then I am not going to second guess them.

In case of vintage products, I do spend a few minutes looking up the history but even then, it is often hard.

 

[respice finem]

If I were an optimist, I would regard the overpaid 800 $ as a kind of a "tuition fee"

 

[amirm]

Why are you sad?
You have now a good DAC with no audible difference with the better dac of these days.

He should be sad because he was led to think this was one of the world's best DACs technically according to the company and it is not remotely so. It has performance that is well below average across nearly 400 DACs tested, old and new.

 

[shal]

He should be sad because he was led to think this was one of the world's best DACs technically according to the company and it is not remotely so. It has performance that is well below average across nearly 400 DACs tested, old and new.

Perhaps..... only if his goal is to own DAC with stellar measurement.

If the goal is to own a transparent DAC with appropriate functionalities and good build quality , perhaps it is a success.


My concern went I choose my DAC there is two years: build quality, balanced output, high level output, transparent DAC , very good volume control and price .... I choose a 10years+ DAC.

Of course , measurements will be average now :
Dynamic Range: -112dB typical, -110 dB minimum
THD+N at max volume (volume = 56) – typical, 0.0008% FS, maximum 0.0013% FS

Ok price list is $1500 , I have payed 300€....

 

[Xyrium]

If you spend $1000 and get a device with a cheap wall wart, you get what you deserve. At least the ChiFi options frequently come with beefy laptop power supplies. To say nothing of the other performance limitations...

I dunno, I guess I got what I deserved....

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?attachments/rme-adi-2-dac-fs-version-2-usb-headphone-amplifier-back-panel-connectors-inputs-outputs-review-jpg.63550/

 

[sarumbear]

@amirm I think you should at least start your review with the year in which the product was first available - in this case 2015..... Its like reviewing an old CRT up against an OLED screen..... (well maybe not that extreme, but the advances in conversion technology have come a long way in six years...)

If a CRT TV was on the market it is expected to be judged along with OLED TVs. Why would anyone be interested when a unit was first went into production? If it’s still on sale and reviewed recently it’s a current unit and compared as such.