Need advice for upgrading current DAC.

[restorer-john]

maybe @restorer-john can guide you in where to find the best capacitors for your Stax?

Personally, I wouldn't touch any capacitors until I had thoroughly tested them.

There's a lot of expense replacing all the caps in those amps and they will lose their originality and collectibility. They are a superb amplifier.

 

[Tiberius]

Personally, I wouldn't touch any capacitors until I had thoroughly tested them.

There's a lot of expense replacing all the caps in those amps and they will lose their originality and collectibility. They are a superb amplifier.

Yes, they are amazing. So you know them. They are of superb build quality and I still enjoy them but I wonder about the caps. 42 years is 42 years, as they were made in 1979, and they do deteriorate. I would rather leave them alone but when caps deteriorate do the amps still sound as good as they can? Another thing I can do is when the caps go I can replace the amps with a Bryston 3B.

 

[Tiberius]

Nope no idea on the finding thing. Fancy amp for subs...

Yeah, I splurged. I was looking at buying one for about 2 years and when the Crown CTs600 I was using went on me I decided to get the Bryston and found one used with 8 years warranty left.

 

[restorer-john]

Yes, they are amazing. So you know them. They are of superb build quality and I still enjoy them but I wonder about the caps. 42 years is 42 years and they do deteriorate. I would rather leave them alone but when caps deteriorate do the amps still sound as good as they can? Another thing I can do is when the caps go I can replace the amps with a Bryston 3B.

Capacitors can be just as good as the day they were made or just about to vent or fail. Modern capacitors are no better in terms of reliability and many are smaller and I would argue will never last 42 years like yours have.

The only way to determine is to test the amplifiers thoroughly and see if they still hit spec, have no noise on the rails and the main caps are still on or close to spec for capacity and ESR. But all it takes is one cap somewhere in the amp to fail... But remember, capacitors are not the only thing to deteriorate or fail. They are just an easy target for hobbyists to pick on for replacement.

 

[Tiberius]

maybe @restorer-john can guide you in where to find the best capacitors for your Stax?

Thanks for this. I have been searching the web unsuccessfully.

 

[Tiberius]

Capacitors can be just as good as the day they were made or just about to vent or fail. Modern capacitors are no better in terms of reliability and many are smaller and I would argue will never last 42 years like yours have.

The only way to determine is to test the amplifiers thoroughly and see if they still hit spec, have no noise on the rails and the main caps are still on or close to spec for capacity and ESR. But all it takes is one cap somewhere in the amp to fail... But remember, capacitors are not the only thing to deteriorate or fail. They are just an easy target for hobbyists to pick on for replacement.

Yes, thanks. These are massive caps. Are there any caps available today that are of the same quality?

 

[restorer-john]

Yes, thanks. These are massive caps. Are there any caps available today that are of the same quality?

Absolutely yes, Easy to find excellent large value caps. But it's not just the PSU caps. They are likely fine. Look at all the other caps in your amps. There may be tantalums (which are time bombs), small electros etc. You need to find a real passionate audio technician who won't feed you BS lines about needing this and needing that.

Wish I could help, but you are on the other side of the world.

 

[Tiberius]

Absolutely yes, Easy to find excellent large value caps. But it's not just the PSU caps. They are likely fine. Look at all the other caps in your amps. There may be tantalums (which are time bombs), small electros etc. You need to find a real passionate audio technician who won't feed you BS lines about needing this and needing that.

Wish I could help, but you are on the other side of the world.

Yeah that is what I have been trying to do, find a decent technician. I just found out that the two in here Toronto area are out of business. One, God rest his soul, has died and the other quit.

I noticed where you are and you are the person I need. Too bad. Beautiful country you live in. Always wanted to visit.

 

[GDK]

Yeah that is what I have been trying to do, find a decent technician. I just found out that the two in here Toronto area are out of business. One, God rest his soul, has died and the other quit.

I noticed where you are and you are the person I need. Too bad. Beautiful country you live in. Always wanted to visit.

A bit of google research came up with these names, however I have no experience with either and therefore cannot recommend. Please do your own due diligence:

https://www.humphreysrepaircentre.com/
https://www.electronicsfirstaid.com/

 

[Tiberius]

A bit of google research came up with these names, however I have no experience with either and therefore cannot recommend. Please do your own due diligence:

https://www.humphreysrepaircentre.com/
https://www.electronicsfirstaid.com/

Thanks for theses sites. I talked with the techie at Humphrey's and I did not like what he had to say and I also read few bad reviews about them. However, I found this shop: National Sound in Toronto and called them. The techie Paul used to sell the Stax and knows them well! Who knows he may have been the one to sell them to my friend who I bought them from! He advised me to leave them alone until something goes wrong as they are built amazingly well ( which I already knew ) and then call him for repairs. Well, to me that's about as honest as you can get because he did not ask me to tote them down there and slap me with some sort of unnecessary repairs. I am so glad there are still good folks like this around.

 

[Tiberius]

Absolutely yes, Easy to find excellent large value caps. But it's not just the PSU caps. They are likely fine. Look at all the other caps in your amps. There may be tantalums (which are time bombs), small electros etc. You need to find a real passionate audio technician who won't feed you BS lines about needing this and needing that.

Wish I could help, but you are on the other side of the world.

I found this shop: National Sound in Toronto and he basically said what you said. He said if there is nothing wrong leave them alone until there is something to fix because they are built so well. So glad I found a reliable service technician.

 

[Alt-Wrong]

Hello, would someone shed some light as to whether an upgrade for me is worth doing. I own a Lavry DA11 2009 version and am still satisfied with it except for stereo depth and height. It is somewhat hard to place instruments at times and I would like to know whether an upgrade to the Benchmark DAC3 is worth doing for me or do I need to spend much more, which I really do not want to do. I only want the barebones Benchmark and there is not much difference in price to the Lavry. I was also looking to buy the Schitt Yggdrasil but now know much more about it from the great review on this website. Any advice would be much appreciated.

hi T.-
if i may, what did you end up doing re: your lavry?

just dusted off my old da11, that’d been superseded by an auralic vega for quite awhile now.
i’ve kinda fallen back in love a bit, especially driving these Alessandro ms2 headphones,
and being fed by an Audiophilleo2 w/purepower via rca dig. input directly, no cable.

that near-zero headphone out impedance really gets a grip on the modded grados,
that the ms2’s are, and delivers super-tight, astounding bass. their overall tonal balance
now is near my senny hd800’s. selling the hd800 (and hdva 600) (mostly to down-size)

the da11’s usb input was never a highpoint, but could work in a pinch, and i used it mostly
with apple’s powered cam.connect.kit and ipad pro for media consumption. using the kit
into the ap2w/pp, then into lavry’s dig. in is quite stunning, esp. in comparison to usb in.

also got very decent results using lavry’s xlr in from a monarchy audio dip24/96, letting
the dip format-convert toslink and rca to feed the lav’s transformer-coupled xlr. the lavry
seems ready to scale up with an increase in digital input quality, whereas the vega is ready
to make everything sound good.

another lav bonus is that high-quality analog-domain pre-amp out. when inputting into
audioengine a5’s, i can set the lavry’s output to around 30, which let’s me use the a5’s volume
knob in the 12-2 o’clock range, versus around 9 o’clock when fed by 2v stnd. outputs.

the da11’s far from SOtA these days, but for certain use-cases/scenarios can still be useful.
are you still lavry’ing, or…

cheers