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Burr-Brown based DAC measurements

TheTalbotHound

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Hello ASR. I'm curious to know what the best measuring Burr-Brown based DAC is, since i don't think i've seen one that does better than maybe 100DB sinad (although the best i could remember off the top of my head is the iFi zen DAC with barely 90DB). I'm having trouble sorting through all the DAC reviews to find Burr-Brown based stuff though. Do any of you know what the, say, 3 best measuring Burr-Brown based devices on here are?
 

Veri

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The PecanPi DAC has in-house AP measurements:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/pecanpi®-usb-dac-and-headphone-amplifier.11097/

You can see the measurement is noise-limited. Distortion is at or under -120dB, yet can't seem to squeeze more than ~111dB SINAD out of these flagship burr brown chips. And this is in dual mono configuration. Burr Brown stuff doesn't really seem to compete with top of the line AKM/ESS chips nowadays, or Cirrus Logic for that matter, see D30 Pro.

In any case all audible threshold limits are reached so there is no issue. And I own PecanPi (usb only, from before coax was added as an input) and it sounds as good as any properly engineered DAC... :)
 
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TheTalbotHound

TheTalbotHound

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nice to know that such devices can exist. thanks
 

mansr

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Hello ASR. I'm curious to know what the best measuring Burr-Brown based DAC is, since i don't think i've seen one that does better than maybe 100DB sinad (although the best i could remember off the top of my head is the iFi zen DAC with barely 90DB). I'm having trouble sorting through all the DAC reviews to find Burr-Brown based stuff though. Do any of you know what the, say, 3 best measuring Burr-Brown based devices on here are?
Ifi have bizarre fondness for the mid-tier Burr-Brown DAC chips, and their love affair with MQA has resulted in hobbled performance. A decent design based on the top Burr-Brown chips (PCM1792A and variants) should do considerably better.
 

mansr

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They say pcm1794a is the best performing Burr-Brown Dac chip
when used in (Dual configuration) 132dB SNR
https://Ti.com/product/PCM1794A
PCM1792A and PCM1794A are the same chip, only the control interface differs. There is also a variant that accepts DSD input. All should have the same analogue performance.
 
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TheTalbotHound

TheTalbotHound

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Ifi have bizarre fondness for the mid-tier Burr-Brown DAC chips, and their love affair with MQA has resulted in hobbled performance. A decent design based on the top Burr-Brown chips (PCM1792A and variants) should do considerably better.

Are there any other such decent Burr Brown designs other than the Pecan Pi?
 

Patrick1958

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Are there any other such decent Burr Brown designs other than the Pecan Pi?
If i remember correctly John (topping engineer) mentioned the TEAC UD-501 has a sinad of 114.
I can not find the post where he mentioned it showing the measurement.
 

DSJR

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How much worse would Burr brown chipsets from the early to mid 90's perform these days? they seem to 'sound' fine, but still.......
 

chris719

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The PecanPi DAC has in-house AP measurements:
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/pecanpi®-usb-dac-and-headphone-amplifier.11097/

You can see the measurement is noise-limited. Distortion is at or under -120dB, yet can't seem to squeeze more than ~111dB SINAD out of these flagship burr brown chips. And this is in dual mono configuration. Burr Brown stuff doesn't really seem to compete with top of the line AKM/ESS chips nowadays, or Cirrus Logic for that matter, see D30 Pro.

In any case all audible threshold limits are reached so there is no issue. And I own PecanPi (usb only, from before coax was added as an input) and it sounds as good as any properly engineered DAC... :)

It seems strange to me that they can only achieve that level of noise with a mono implementation. The distortion is actually a little better than I would expect.
 

raif71

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Having owned both ifi hip-dac and zen dac, I would say that I don't mind the sound of burr-brown dacs if there is a "sound" at all.
 

chris719

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Having owned both ifi hip-dac and zen dac, I would say that I don't mind the sound of burr-brown dacs if there is a "sound" at all.

There isn't a sound. The mid 90s BB DACs were designed by different groups and with completely different architectures than the PCM179x. There would be no mechanism by which this sound could survive and not show up in the measurements.

Just being pedantic, but technically anything from PCM179x and on are TI DACs. I'm sure only insiders know who contributed what. They still throw the logo around in the datasheet of course since the brand carried a well-deserved good reputation, but I'm sure there's been a fair bit of turnover in the past 20+ years.
 

chris719

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The BURSON Conductor V2Plus is interesting
that you can swap between 2 Dac cards (ESS Sabre 9018) or (Bur-Brown 1793)

The modular concept is neat, but I can almost guarantee that if it's made by Burson it's a bad implementation of something :).
 
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Veri

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There isn't a sound. The mid 90s BB DACs were designed by different groups and with completely different architectures than the PCM179x. There would be no mechanism by which this sound could survive and not show up in the measurements.
Very good point ;)

The modular concept is neat, but I can almost guarantee that if it's made by Burson it's a bad implementation of something :).
I think their newest Conductor is on its way to Amir, so we'll see soon enough how good their ESS9038Q2M implementation is :eek:
 
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TheTalbotHound

TheTalbotHound

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Very good point ;)


I think their newest Conductor is on its way to Amir, so we'll see soon enough how good their ESS9038Q2M implementation is :eek:

NIce. Is he getting to measure their Soloist headphone amp too?
 

HoweSound

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I have the PS Audio Digital Link iii which uses the Burr-Brown (TI) PCM1798. Dac is rated at 123 dB. This has been my main dac for many years using balanced output. It may be supplanted by a Leaf Audio balanced dual es9038Q2M dac that's being shipped to me now.

PS Audio seems to have lost their mojo with poor products like the DirectStream and Sprout amp, but I've been very happy with the circa 2004 Digital Link and my GCC100 amp. Build quality is stout.
 

jackdanyal

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it's really fun when reading that one chip is better than another one because of SINAD. All that SINAD things do not make any sense. it's impossible to hear any difference between SINAD 120 and 90 even. and chip doesn't matter. architecture matter. you can get absolutely ****** results with top tier AKM/ESS chip if it was badly implemented and get better performance from low tier chip is the arch is better.
 
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