Massdrop Airist R2R DAC Review

[LuckyLuke575]

I've been causing some controversy with this review on the Airist product page on Massdrop and replying to one of the reviewers on Head-Fi who's review was quoted on the product page, especially the statement: The signature is one of general neutrality with a touch of sweetness to the mid-range and upper registers, and a distinctly “pristine” quality/clarity to the sound

The general feedback on Massdrop has been good, with many people actually quoting the ASR review before I got there (a big win), although the dissenters are trying to argue that they like the distorted sound the DAC prodcues, while on Head-Fi they don't see to like objective measurements / ASR much

Thanks @amirm for keeping this up; I believe it's making a difference for people trying to make informed buying decisions.

 

[qwerty88]

I've been causing some controversy with this review on the Airist product page on Massdrop and replying to one of the reviewers on Head-Fi who's review was quoted on the product page, especially the statement: The signature is one of general neutrality with a touch of sweetness to the mid-range and upper registers, and a distinctly “pristine” quality/clarity to the sound

The general feedback on Massdrop has been good, with many people actually quoting the ASR review before I got there (a big win), although the dissenters are trying to argue that they like the distorted sound the DAC prodcues, while on Head-Fi they don't see to like objective measurements / ASR much

Thanks @amirm for keeping this up; I believe it's making a difference for people trying to make informed buying decisions.

Some of what you wrote on HF:

I can now tell why I've never been attracted to this site. It's made up of a bunch of amateur reviewers / charlatans / biased and compromised individuals / useful idiots (take your pick) writing about their own experience with no objectivity whatsoever.

We've been called plenty of names by subjectivists. Let's not stoop to their level. I like to think that we're better than that. I would've simply said that this DAC measured poorly and is overpriced and left it at that.

EDIT: added webarchive link

 

[Shaman]

Hard to believe - almost 1000 sold.. $350,000 fleeced from 1000 sheep..

Does make you understand why we have the number of 'fleecing companys' around that we do. More than enough $$ being spent to make it worthwhile...

If I were a bit younger, I could be tempted to start another outfit offering $1000 cables and A/C regenerators - to get the synergistic benefits of both..

The Dark Side - so tempting!

Worth a read of the sales pitch:
https://drop.com/buy/massdrop-x-airist-audio-r-2r-dac

This is really.... bad. That board looks like something out of the 1970's. I suppose their next version will have " revolutionary discrete diode logic and innovative magnetic core memory..."

Yeeesh

 

[LuckyLuke575]

Some of what you wrote on HF:
We've been called plenty of names by subjectivists. Let's not stoop to their level. I like to think that we're better than that. I would've simply said that this DAC measured poorly and is overpriced and left it at that.

EDIT: added webarchive link

Haha nice find on that one. That comment in particular was personal because of a bad experience I had following reading a whole thread of reviews on there that led me to buy a DAC/AMP that I ended up returning due to a number of issues, and seeing this being touted on Massdrop as some kind of authoritative review that could mislead people was indigenous and it reminded me of that.

 

[qwerty88]

Haha nice find on that one. That comment in particular was personal because of a bad experience I had following reading a whole thread of reviews on there that led me to buy a DAC/AMP that I ended up returning due to a number of issues, and seeing this being touted on Massdrop as some kind of authoritative review that could mislead people was indigenous and it reminded me of that.

Ah, that string of audiophile terms, *barf*. To be honest, I was impressed how many of them one can include in a sentence. As one of the follow-up comments alludes, I'm sure there's a drinking game somewhere among that mash of audiophile terms., ;-)

 

[Bronco]

Zeos won't be that happy!

No doubt he's more likely been impressed by the 2,5V output...

Is that what “lifts the veil”? Half a volt?

 

[solderdude]

Veil's are often only lifted in the mind.

 

[amirm]

Veil's are often only lifted in the mind.

Minds that seem to have countless ones embedded in there as to be lifted with tweak after tweak...

 

[raif71]

I too have an account over there but I'd like to think that I get the best of both sites

 

[LuckyLuke575]

Ah, that string of audiophile terms, *barf*. To be honest, I was impressed how many of them one can include in a sentence. As one of the follow-up comment alludes, I'm sure there's a drinking game somewhere among that mash of audiophile terms., ;-)

In my trade, we like to call this kind of thing "bullshit bingo", and I guess it applies to these wonderful word strings too

 

[Tup3x]

I guess the point of this kinds of DAC is not to try to produce clean signal. But I do wonder why go through all the trouble of making these when one could get at 1€ Realtek chip and make really poor implementation and distort the output on purpose.

 

[Veri]

I guess the point of this kinds of DAC is not to try to produce clean signal. But I do wonder why go through all the trouble of making these when one could get at 1€ Realtek chip and make really poor implementation and distort the output on purpose.

Realtek is not marketed as such but yeah.

 

[raif71]

Maybe I'll just go to my local audio store....they have a bunch of audio-gd r2r products, just for a listen

 

[Veri]

I used to think all r2r dac are just junk. But in this review the Holo Spring looks pretty nice.
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...s-of-holo-audio-spring-dac.10047/#post-273364
What causes the difference?
And there is also a version 2. Would it be better?

1) Yes it's nice. But there's many chip-based DACs that are tons cheaper and manage the same or better IMD, SNR, ...
2) It is a carefully made, no cut corners, maximum performance modern-design R2R DAC. There is feedback, opamp output stage; good engineering.
3) Spring 2 is about same performance, it is a marginal update changing some parts, making output less "hot", increasing max sampling input.

 

[Killingbeans]

I used to think all r2r dac are just junk. But in this review the Holo Spring looks pretty nice.

It's an impressive piece of engineering, yes, and it's certainly a good DAC. But it still only performs roughly equivalent to a Topping D50s.

Personally I don't think the novelty of R2R is worth the extra money... not by far.

 

[Tom Schofield]

Let's keep some perspective. In the analog days, -70db would be a good figure for turntable rumble, and way better than channel separation.

 

[ousi]

This is much worse than some of the later R2R Chip DAC (PCM63 for example, or the TDA series from Philips). Just check the datasheet of PCM63 or TDA1541

 

[Jimster480]

While that could be true; the performance of every R2R chip is pretty terrible by todays standards. Therefore there is no reason to use them anymore.

 

[gvl]

While that could be true; the performance of every R2R chip is pretty terrible by todays standards. Therefore there is no reason to use them anymore.

PCM63P-K's 108dB DR/100dB SINAD isn't too shabby even by today's standards. PCM1704 is even better. Naturally not as good as the ES9038Pro but far from being terrible. Definitely more than you even need for CD playback. You can parallel them to further improve the numbers. They are obsolete parts however no longer in production. SMSL was working on a new PCM1704 DAC, I guess we need to wait and see how it performs if it is ever released.

 

[beefkabob]

R2r is just more work than necessary. More money too.