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New Emotiva DAC, how will it test?

Were you using a ‘lively’ dac before?
Keith
 
If it sounds decent at all, there is a big plus side. Emotiva offers a 5 year transferable warranty from a company you can actually get a response from and will honor their warranty. I like the Toppings and SMSL's of the world but reliability and getting service on them can be a horrible if not impossible process. Those factors are keeping me from exploring any higher end options from these type of options. From various sites it seems like there are too many failures within 2 years and little or no post sales support from them. This seems to be true save for if you purchase from a few companies like APOS who provide their own 1 year warranty service and seem to be very responsive and reliable in this regards.

It would be nice though to see the actual test measurements on this one.
 
You said you rely on MEASURED specs and listening. Why, don't you trust the brand? If measured and they lie, would you buy?
 
Adding my $0.02 on this since I bought an Emotiva XDA-3 last January.

Hated it.

I loved the form factor, and chassis styling. And the "pre-amp" feature as a pass-thru, helped support additional analog devices so fit really nice in my system.

But the sound was just terrible.

The XDA-3 added digital artifacts in the top end, clearly audible, regardless the digital source. Stuff you would near NOT on the vinyl or CD masterings.

After doing more reading on this, it seems this is a common character of oversampling DACs. Even the Emotiva user manual warns of "hearing things."

But after $900 my 20yo CD Player's onboard DAC still sounds better. So much for "technology improvement!" I guess oversampling DACs are not for me.

Yeah not fond on Emotiva stuff lately. Related: this guy recently did a VERY GUSHING review of Emotiva's CD transport.


An expensive Redbook only player, AND it will NOT play CDs gapless!!!! I mean you could get away with that in the late 80s, but TODAY??? WTF?

(...and the reviewer was "fine" with gapless??? huh? quite annoying if listening to live concert recordings!!)
 
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Did you try the different filters in the Emotiva XDA-3, including Brickwall?

I like my RME ADI FS-2. Even better, though, when I put a tube preamp between the DAC and the amplifier. Typical, I gather, is the Alstine Transcendence 10 RB. It does not produce a retro "warm" sound, just more realistic. (Yes, this is to my ear, not by measurement.) Also good is the Linear Tube Audio MZ2. It brings out details without sounding artificial.
 
Chazz6 said:
Did you try the different filters in the Emotiva XDA-3, including Brickwall?

I like my RME ADI FS-2. Even better, though, when I put a tube preamp between the DAC and the amplifier. Typical, I gather, is the Alstine Transcendence 10 RB. It does not produce a retro "warm" sound, just more realistic. (Yes, this is to my ear, not by measurement.) Also good is the Linear Tube Audio MZ2. It brings out details without sounding artificial.
Click to expand...

Yeah. I found filters five and six the best to my ears. Those seemed to have "less" added artifacts, but you could still hear it. I ended up selling the XDA-3.

If I try another external DAC it might be an R2R. But I need to address (slightly underpowered) amplification first :)
 
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