Rega DAC-R DAC Review

[Tangband]

Says who? Jitter performance is nothing special, how will this make it better vs something modern costing around $100? I also don't understand why you just don't use the Wiim Pro directly? It has a similar performance, an even more pronounced second harmonic, and no PS hum. No point in spending money on an old obsolete DAC.

The WiiM pro with its internal dac sounds very inferior to the Rega dac R .
Ofcourse I would use it If it sounded better.
And now comes the question - how can that be ?

 

[voodooless]

The WiiM pro with its internal dac sounds very inferior to the Rega dac R .
Ofcourse I would use it If it sounded better.

Uhuh

 

[DSJR]

American equipment was dismissed as 'Voiced for American rooms/tastes'.

Japanese was what people who didn't really 'know' about hi-fi bought.

European brands were viewed much like the French cars of the time - quirky and not for everyone.

That went on until the 1990s.

Have a read of the mid 80's HiFi Choice amplifier books authored by Martin Colloms. SINAD had absolutely NOTHING to do with the conclusions!!!

 

[Billy Budapest]

The WiiM pro with its internal dac sounds very inferior to the Rega dac R .
Ofcourse I would use it If it sounded better.
And now comes the question - how can that be ?

You might *think* it sounds better now, but you cannot be sure until you do an ABX double blind test. You would in all probability not reliably hear any differences. When you are doing uncontrolled sighted testing, lots of other influences come into play that can unconsciously influence what you think you hear. All of that goes away with scientific testing.

 

[Billy Budapest]

Uhuh

Exactly.

 

[Purité Audio]

Have a read of the mid 80's HiFi Choice amplifier books authored by Martin Colloms. SINAD had absolutely NOTHING to do with the conclusions!!!

Was this before Colloms was receiving stuff from importers?
Keith

 

[DSJR]

Was this before Colloms was receiving free stuff from importers?
Keith

I don't know. Later (in the 90's) he had 'consulted' on all manner of electronics and not just speakers which he'd designed and consulted on since the early 70's.

Not sure about free stuff though, but I can say that some distributors and makers were a bit tardy shall I say, in asking for loan stuff back from another reviewer I knew very well back then...

 

[Billy Budapest]

And by the way, I used to own the Rega DAC-R V1 that had the 5 filter choices (rather than the three this version has). I used it in an all-Rega mini system in my office—Rega DAC-R, Apollo-R, Brio-R, RS-1 speakers, and REL T-5 subwoofer. All Rega except for the sub. Sounded fine. It reproduced music. It fit in a small space. So I am not just “busting” on Rega without any perspective. I owned it. I sold it off after about 7 years.

 

[Sokel]

If you like the sound from Regas turntables or early Linn:s lp12 then you probably gonna like the sound from Rega dac R. They sound very similar, and different from most clinical sounding chinese dacs.

Have you heard the Rega dac R ?

Admittedly no and not by any taste or distaste,it's just that the talk around was zero,no one interested back then,no one had it around,at that price point hot cakes was the mojo,iFys and the likes.

 

[Sokel]

The “cabling” that is “all over the place” are just ground wires. They are all star-grounded on the side of the chassis.

Again:look at the mains that go to trafo.

 

[Billy Budapest]

Again:look at the mains that go to trafo.

Doesn’t look all over the place to me.

 

[hyfynut]

Interesting review !

As JA has discovered in stereophile - this unit has higher jitter and distortion at higher levels . At -40 dB , the jitter is very low , and looks like this :

View attachment 320264

Rega Research DAC-R D/A processor Measurements

Sidebar 3: Measurements

www.stereophile.com

This is probably deliberately , trying to make a dac that sounds earfriendly. The sound to my ears is very good and one can listen for hours .

I use this dac myself and wouldnt trade it for a cheaper topping , Yamaha or smsl .

But the dac shouldn't sound like anything

 

[sealman]

I wonder who gave them “Great votes”. Probably the company owner himself !!

There are always a few trolls trying to skew the results. I would guess it gives them warm fuzzy feelings to be so edgy!

 

[GXAlan]

I always wondered if subjective impressions of “musicality”, “energy”, “pace, rhythm and timing” could be attributed to certain types of non-linearities

Take a look at this 300B review where we really see the difference between speaker and resistive loads AND the signal level.

Record breaker: Raphaelite CS30-MKII tube amplifier review and measurements

Raphaelite CS30-MKII 300B integrated tube amplifier review: A New Performance Record This is a review and detailed measurements of Raphaelite CS30-MKK 300B single ended tube amplifier. It is available on eBay for $1449 + $310 shipping to California + tax. There are some better deals from...

www.audiosciencereview.com

Or in my opinion, a good example of “we are going to focus on musicality” but engineer the rest of the setup:

Sony TA-ZH1ES: A DAC/Headphone Amp with a Sonic Signature?

Sony TA-ZH1ES: A DAC/Headphone Amp with a Sonic Signature? Stop. やめる. Halt. Arrêt. You probably shouldn’t read the rest of this post, it's triggering. There's a lot of speculation even though there are a good amount of measurements too. If you're looking for a transparent DAC/headphone...

www.audiosciencereview.com

It has level matching that beats the instrument grade E1DA Cosmos ADC, no AC mains noise, and very high levels of distortion and you can even add more distortion with DSEE HX.

The Sony isn’t a good choice for transparency, but I would argue that they have worked hard to match the left and right channels and suppress AC line noise.

 

[Tangband]

About the three selectable digital filters in the Rega dac R : nr 2 using TIDAL with 16 bit 44.1 kHz material sounds best in my opinion.

There are small audible differences in the stereo image between the three digital filters. Nr.1 has a more narrow stereoimage with a slightly more pronounced perceived bass. This pronounced bass with filtering nr.1 cant be seen in any measurements.

Its impossible to hear any difference between the different filterings with only one loudspeaker, but with a good stereo setup its easy.

 

[Koeitje]

Look at PS audios digital gear , mediocre noise results but many people seems to like the sound . And Im sure they do comparisons at home before they buy. Many people also like vinyl and tubes, theres nothing strange about liking the sound from gear that measures poorly.

Its not the actual sound they like though, there is a lot of psychoacoustics going on there.

 

[Peternz]

If it was $300 or less it would be barely acceptable. At the asking price it is broken. Headless.

 

[Bleib]

Its not the actual sound they like though, there is a lot of psychoacoustics going on there.

Yup, expensive high-end so it's gotta sound great.
Same thing when some purchase cables..

 

[RandomEar]

It's Class II double insulated (marked on the back by square within a square symbol) so doesn't need or want an earth pin.

That is correct. But in this case, I think the yellow/green color coding shouldn't be used at all. I suspect that the way the device is wired isn't code compliant in the US or the EU:

[Source]

But to be fair, I'm not that familiar with electrical code. Depending on the region, it may also be different for devices which aren't permanently installed. Nonetheless, this looks like a questionable color choice to me: There is not protective ground connection at all on this device - why would you use cables which indicate that there is one?

 

[restorer-john]

The only real differentiators are feature sets and cosmetics.

And build quality, overall functionality (ease of operation, displays, noises/clicks, response times/delays etc) reliability and cost.