• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Mhdt Labs Pagoda Review (R2R Tube DAC)

Rate this DAC:

  • 1. Poor (headless panther)

    Votes: 262 91.3%
  • 2. Not terrible (postman panther)

    Votes: 4 1.4%
  • 3. Fine (happy panther

    Votes: 1 0.3%
  • 4. Great (golfing panther)

    Votes: 20 7.0%

  • Total voters
    287

fcdvpds

Member
Joined
May 7, 2021
Messages
22
Likes
9
I suppose it would be boring if you listened to the equipment rather than the recording. I don't do that. I listen to the recording. Jim
this shows the level of paranoia around gear review, equipment measurement, etc.
 

AdamG

Proving your point makes it “Science”.
Moderator
Forum Donor
Joined
Jan 3, 2021
Messages
4,636
Likes
14,918
Location
Reality
Please don’t feed the Trolls too well. They will move in and drink all the water out of the Christmas Tree Stand and pee on the ornaments. :oops:
 

Juhazi

Major Contributor
Joined
Sep 15, 2018
Messages
1,717
Likes
2,897
Location
Finland
Another toy to add analog flavour (ie. distortion), for just 21.000$!


 

voodooless

Grand Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Jun 16, 2020
Messages
10,223
Likes
17,799
Location
Netherlands
Another toy to add analog flavour (ie. distortion), for just 21.000$!


This isn’t nearly half as bad: distortion is about 1000x better, it actually has a modern DAC chip and also seems to use a decent reconstruction filter. They just salted it a bit to much with the tubes, trying to justify the ridiculous price :facepalm:
 

KSTR

Major Contributor
Joined
Sep 6, 2018
Messages
2,690
Likes
6,013
Location
Berlin, Germany
Another toy to add analog flavour (ie. distortion), for just 21.000$!


Good luck in identifying the <0.03% distortion levels (with benign harmonic profile) of that DAC in controlled listening tests. Even with pure sines and the best transducers available.
For being a tube DAC it's certainly one of the better ones around.
 

Juhazi

Major Contributor
Joined
Sep 15, 2018
Messages
1,717
Likes
2,897
Location
Finland
^Yes, you must not be a human audiophile to hear this level of distortion. But then this forum is ASR, measurements rule!

I actually can't hear even my 2nd set's tube preamp's musical harmonic distortion, money wasted...


1206Plpfig05.jpg
 

MaxBuck

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
May 22, 2021
Messages
1,515
Likes
2,116
Location
SoCal, Baby!
Another toy to add analog flavour (ie. distortion), for just 21.000$!


Good grief, that Stereophile article is ridiculous. So much psychobabble and fluff.

It's not surprising that the writer's quoted friend is a "visual artist." I'm a recovering one myself.
 

Worth Davis

Active Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Apr 8, 2019
Messages
160
Likes
205
This article is so offensive! i have a mhdt Havana and Stockholm I need to dump on the used market! This might hurt prices! Great review as always
 

Ken1951

Addicted to Fun and Learning
Joined
Sep 28, 2020
Messages
850
Likes
1,775
Location
Blacksburg, VA
Another toy to add analog flavour (ie. distortion), for just 21.000$!


I know less than nothing about DACs or this entire area of audio - and my name isn't even Jon Snow - so my question is this: Is there any actual way that anyone under properly controlled conditions could hear any of the stuff these folks claim to hear? Say put this item up against one of the very top measuring DACs on the list here? I'm very skeptical. Not trolling - just would like to hear from the learned folks here.
 

antennaguru

Senior Member
Joined
Jun 16, 2021
Messages
391
Likes
416
Location
USA
I have owned the MHDT Labs "Steeplechase" DAC for around 10 years and have been using it the whole time on the main system in our mountain house. It didn't sound much different than the old Moon 100D DAC that it replaced there. I liked that the MHDT Labs DAC had a built-in power supply and not a wall wart. It's a reasonably revealing system with Anthony Gallo Acoustics Strada2 Wall Mounted Speakers and a pair of the same company's best powered cylindrical subwoofers. The main amplifier is an ICEpower 125ASX2 driven by a class A input stage that I built, and the line stage is an older remote controlled Classe Audio preamp with lots of inputs. The system also has analog sources as well.

My "Steeplechase" DAC only cost around $500 back around 10 years ago, shipped direct from MHDT Labs, and it had the same little tube output stage as the Pagoda. I imagine it isn't very different than the Pagoda that got so badly panned in this thread. I figured if anything my old, cheaper MHDT Labs DAC was probably even worse, and being that the Pagoda was all the way at the right side of the SINAD stack sort I thought it would be interesting to compared it to a brand new Topping E30 DAC. I also needed to use a separate 5 VDC power supply with the Topping E30 DAC so I used a nice 25 Watt Linear 5VDC power supply I had on hand. The Topping E30 was also tested on this site and ended up at the far left hand end of the SINAD stack sort, and it only cost $120 so this was not a big chance to take.

Well my wife and I didn't do a very well controlled listening test and simply listened to 4 songs from my music server that we know well into the Toslink input of the MHDT Labs Steeplechase DAC. Then I substituted the Topping E30 DAC and linear power supply, and we listened to those same 4 songs again via the Toslink input without touching the system volume control between the two DACs. They both sounded very close to the same volume. It took us a while listening and we both concurred that the Topping E30 sounded ever so slightly clearer and better overall, but the difference was very small to both of us. We have been using the Topping E30 and separate linear power supply for a couple of weeks now, so here are my comments on the DAC "upgrade":

1. Music still sounds good and enjoyable on the system! This is important as I was afraid that removing the small bit of masking that was taking place via tube distortion could make the warts of some recordings more apparent and result in a less forgiving and less enjoyable sound.
2. The Topping is pretty cheap in construction, in keeping with its very cheap price, and it is very tiny - cables do move it around and limit how you can place it.
3. The Topping has a nice display, but it's a shame it always quickly reverts to showing only the volume, because it always shows zero dB - as I don't use it for a volume control, and thus it is always set at full volume. I control system volume with the line stage preamp. I would rather see the data rate, and wish there was a choice.
4. I don't really like not having a built-in power supply with the Topping, as it's a little messy having a separate power supply slightly bigger than the Topping itself.
5. I liked the bigger heavier form factor of the MHDT Labs DAC better, and also that it had more inputs with better switching buttons, and a built-in power supply.
6. The Topping has glitched and gotten stuck twice, but a power reboot fixed it each time.
7. There is clearly no forgetting that the Topping is a cheap product, and the MHDT Labs was a more expensive product, every time I use it - albeit the MHDT Labs is now a little obsolete.

I am keeping the MHDT Labs DAC as a back-up in case the Topping fails, and also that I do miss its physical form factor compared to the Topping.

What I found most interesting was that going from one DAC with a SINAD probably sorted all the way to the right edge ("bad"), to another DAC with a SINAD sorted close to the left edge ("great") wasn't a very noticeable "upgrade" to us, and it took several minutes of continued listening to conclude that the Topping was indeed ever so slightly clearer and better overall from a transparency standpoint. Clearly we did not feel this was a major system upgrade from a listening standpoint - although it was apparently so from a test and measurement standpoint.
 

audio2design

Major Contributor
Joined
Nov 29, 2020
Messages
1,769
Likes
1,830
damn...you guys comment on this stuff with very little knowledge about digital audio...

I will go on a limb and say I have forgotten more about digital audio than you know and there are people here that know more than I do. Always best to read the room. This is Audio Science Review not Audiogon
 

audio2design

Major Contributor
Joined
Nov 29, 2020
Messages
1,769
Likes
1,830
i understand your view. put it this way, most design choices comprise trade offs. think about a digital camera. The standard is to have anti aliasing filter. Ricoh GR and a very few other cameras omit the filter. The result is increased resolution but artefacts occur in many situations that need to be removed in post processing. In general, low pass filter is the best option and that's why it's the standard choice in dacs. that being said, it is good to have alternative design options that may suit the taste of some people better. the non-sense is to complain about poor measured performance on a dac without filter!

I could go into why there is less requirement for an optical low pass today but I feel it will be beyond you since you don't understand the difference between signal capture and signal reconstruction.
 

solderdude

Grand Contributor
Joined
Jul 21, 2018
Messages
15,891
Likes
35,912
Location
The Neitherlands
3. The Topping has a nice display, but it's a shame it always quickly reverts to showing only the volume, because it always shows zero dB - as I don't use it for a volume control, and thus it is always set at full volume. I control system volume with the line stage preamp. I would rather see the data rate, and wish there was a choice.

There is a choice.
The E30 standard comes in pre-amp mode. You must switch it to DAC mode.
Just set it to standby, press and hold the On/Off button on the touch panel for about 3 seconds until you see “DAC” written on screen, release the button and power it on.
 
Last edited:

Svperstar

Senior Member
Joined
Jul 4, 2018
Messages
342
Likes
222
What I found most interesting was that going from one DAC with a SINAD probably sorted all the way to the right edge ("bad"), to another DAC with a SINAD sorted close to the left edge ("great") wasn't a very noticeable "upgrade" to us, and it took several minutes of continued listening to conclude that the Topping was indeed ever so slightly clearer and better overall from a transparency standpoint. Clearly we did not feel this was a major system upgrade from a listening standpoint - although it was apparently so from a test and measurement standpoint.

As I said earlier in the thread on my MHDT Labs Paradisea+ I had a non-audiophile friend listen and she said "Its like there are parts of the song missing". The Paradisea+ cost me $600 + shipping in 2006. My X-Fi Elite Pro($400 top of the line soundcard for 2006) sounded leaps and bounds better.
 

antennaguru

Senior Member
Joined
Jun 16, 2021
Messages
391
Likes
416
Location
USA
As I said earlier in the thread on my MHDT Labs Paradisea+ I had a non-audiophile friend listen and she said "Its like there are parts of the song missing". The Paradisea+ cost me $600 + shipping in 2006. My X-Fi Elite Pro($400 top of the line soundcard for 2006) sounded leaps and bounds better.
You probably had a bad tube. The problem with using tube output circuits on a DAC is that not all tubes are actually good in the first place nor do the good ones all actually sound good. My Steeplechase with the delivered tube didn’t sound as good as the Moon 100D DAC I was replacing until I tried two different replacement tubes, and one of them was far better sounding than the rest. Once it had a good tube installed it sounded comparable to the Moon 100D DAC I was updating. The good news is that the good tube sounded good for some 10 years.
 

antennaguru

Senior Member
Joined
Jun 16, 2021
Messages
391
Likes
416
Location
USA
There is a choice.
The E30 standard comes in pre-amp mode. You must switch it to DAC mode.
Just set it to standby, press and hold the On/Off button on the touch panel for about 3 seconds until you see “DAC” written on screen, release the button and power it on.
THANK YOU! That trick worked, and now it shows the data rate instead of the volume control. Appreciate your advice!!!
 

srkbear

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Nov 16, 2021
Messages
1,029
Likes
1,445
Location
Dallas, TX
People don't like scratches, the don't like pops and clicks, they don't like too much noise.

Beyond that, those paying customers will pick a less than accurate but pleasant reproduction 9 out of 10 times.

It is in fact those audio professionals who have shown that people like distortion, that they like noise, that a non-flat frequency response is preferable, etc. etc. whose research I am using, not to mention my own. I could take a studio recording, mix in a realistic, but fake crowd subtle in the background (synced to the music) and most will prefer it to the original even though there is a loss of dynamic range and low level detail. Why? They perceive it as more real.

In fact, just the opposite is often done. Various plug-ins to simulate tape artifacts like compression. Plug-ins to add distortion. Even plugs ins to add noise. All of these are used, and used regularly in recordings, not to mention fake reverb, etc.etc. You confuse audio with music. Audio is the science, but this is not about science this is about music, and that is an art. We just use aspects of science in the creation and reproduction. We even use aspects of that science that take the result away from perfect because science tells us that people will prefer the result.
Forgive the belated response, but this old argument for the supposed sterility of accurately rendered audio, man. Once and for all, it is the prerogative of the listener to apply whatever effects they please to suit their own listening preferences. It is the responsibility of the DAC to convert the digital facsimile of the original recording, however it was reshaped during the mastering process, into the most accurate analog reproduction possible.

Some folks prefer how music sounds when it is distorted by tubes or vinyl. That doesn’t mean we should bake the distortion into the master. Since everyone’s subjective preferences are different, the goal should be to start with a clean palate, and to add condiments to taste—thus is the origin of the phrase “high fidelity” and the gold standard of the industry since its inception.

I’m not sure what you were up to in this thread, but once again it suggests the defensive, contrarian stance of someone who has dropped a wad of cash on a product, and is determined to use whatever tactics possible to gaslight the hard evidence borne out of rigorous and objective analysis. If you like how the thing sounds, no one can argue with that—wouldn’t it be easier and more intellectually honest just to own that, instead of attempting to rewrite the rules arbitrarily?
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom