For exactly that reason, my Pre One is a keeper!
Paul
ATC 50 Active + ATC SCA2 preamp + Bartok
I tried to connect the DAC directly as digital preamp, but with ATC’s preamplifier sound better for me.
Bartok digital preamp part much better than Debussy
Balanced out into MBL Corona preamp+power. Superb
I have my Bartok going in to a Naim NAC 282 pre amp (with a Hi Cap) and then a pair of recently serviced Naim 135 power amps using Shunyata Venom V10 power cables. Sounds terrific!
I am a headphones person, so i have my Bartok into a pair of Hifiman HE1000SE with ForzaAudioWorks balanced cable. Sounds superb 
- Roon core on Win 10 PC
- Tidal Master
- Roon endpoint: dCS Bartók HDAC
- dCS Rossini clock
- Benchmark HPA4 line / headphones amp
- Simaudio Moon 760 A power amp
- Bowers & Wilkins 805 D3 speakers
- IsoAcoustics Aperta 200 isolation stands
- Focal Utopia headphones
- Crystal Cable Dream Duet XLR headphones cable
- AudioQuest Niagara 1000 Low-Z Power | Noise-Dissipation System
- AudioQuest: all AC, XLR / ethernet / USB interconnect and speaker cables
- Apogee Wyde Eye word clock cables
- my old Marantz CD-80 cd player
- MusicTools rack
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I’m intrigued to know why you have a separate headphone amp when you have the Bartok HDAC?
The HPA4 came in last week, and I wanted it for:
- being able to use the 6V out from the Bartók at unity gain
- being able to upgrade to dCS Rossini later, and still being able to listen to my Focal Utopias
Result: Utopias ánd Moon 760A sound even better than directly out of the Bartók. Low level listening and bass response are way better. The HPA4 for me, as a line amp and as a headphone amp, is really taking the Bartók to the next level.
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Where I said amp, I meant a ultra linear attenuator. The Bartók delivers 6V out, best definition highest SNR, and the Benchmark lets you attenuate that to the best level of SQ to both headphones and power amp.
Apart from the bla bla, it just sounds great, even better than without.
@Erno - Are you feeding your DAC direct from you PC using ethernet? If so then you will have some upside in sound quality from moving to a music server or even a NAS and a decent network switch.
I run my library from a NAS through an English Electric 8Switch and use a BlueJeansAudio ethernet cable. Definitely made a difference to my setup.
Also i saw you have a Crystal Cable Dream Duet XLR headphones cable and was wondering how you find that compared to your stock cable?
Thanks
Jon
@JonD I mainly stream music over switch and ethernet, with switch and Bartók fed through AudioQuest Vodka, from Tidal Master. But I also have a music library residing on my Synology NAS.
The Crystal Cable Dream Duet XLR headphones cable is fantastic, compared with the stock cable, in two ways. Firstly it is extremely lightweight, and does not give any mechanical noise to the Utopia. Secondly its sound is more wide and unveiled. Dynamics are improved, but that could also be because of XLR instead of jack.
My pile:
dCS Puccini
dCS Bartók
Both fed by dCS Puccini u-clock
Naim 252 Supercap DR
Naim 300DR
Harbeth SHL5
Naim UC
Roon ROCK on NUC (now changed the NUC into an Akasa fanless case)
Entreq Tellus
All powered by PS P20
Picture tkn while working from home haha
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Burmester 011 pre, kr or primare a32 power, burmestrer 001cd aw transport, clearaudio turntable, asr phono, nordost cables
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Ermos, I was interested to see your setup. I’m a long time headphone listener (Sennheiser HD800S, currently) and have an HPA-4 connected to my Puccini player (6 V output). I also use it as a pre-amp, and even make use of the mono subwoofer output. It could have been designed for me. My previous headphone amp was the Sennheiser model made to go with the HD800. The HPA-4 beats it by miles. I was curious as to whether the Bartok headphone amp was as good, and you’ve answered my question. I love the HPA-4 as a pre-amp too. Tremendous value.
Simon.
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@Simon_C The Bartók headphones amp is very good, but I just recently found out that using the HPA4 both as a headphones and pre amp is even better, so I completely agree with you: it could have been designed for me!
I want to comment on the images posted.
All except (perhaps) one show what Ken Kessler has referred to as " An altar to hi-fi" built between the speakers.
I am very aware that everyone except multi millionaires has to make compromises when housing large audio systems. But building this “infill” between speakers has two negative effects, one acoustical the other psychoacoustic.
If you place lots of acoustically reflective objectives between the speakers you are compromising the soundstage that you should otherwise hear.
The eye is our dominant sensory organ. Lots of gear placed between speakers means that ( unless eyes closed or blindfolded) your brain will tend to hear the sound coming from the components and you will not enjoy the full illusion of stereo. There is ( or was) a very interesting white paper from the BBC on this.
Curiously I was not thinking at all about this last week when it was very hot in London. So I connected my fan which is about 75 cm tall and placed it in the normally unoccupied space between my speakers. I soon realised that there was an immediate reduction of the soundstage which normally stretches in depth beyond the front wall given the right recording.
So if you can place your equipment rack to the side of the speakers. If that is impossible then, again if you can, limit the height of the central rack to the lower 33% of the speakers.
I’ll bet that few of you will follow my advice but at least I have got it off of my chest. That altar is not a good idea even though so many seem to follow the idea.
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Except one indeed, my desktop audio altar is to the side, the centerpiece being however another visual, a big 4K LED monitor between the 805 D3 monitors 
When I go to a live rock gig (seems long time ago), there is this other irritating thing in the middle: the band.
Your advice is often appreciated, but now you sound like an altar boy.
Pete, absolutely! In fact I’ve been thinking downsizing and cutting down the box counts and move everything into more eye pleasing aesthetics. It’s ridiculous of my racks being the centerpiece
But here they are now so have to bear them for a while…
Agree absolutely with this. No photo but very simple to explain: Speakers (SHL5 Anniversary) are 2ft in front of the electronic boxes (Network Bridge, PS Audio Directstream DAC, Primare A.60 amp etc) which are all in a low cupboard. I found best sound quality resulted when I had some of the cupboard doors open (but not all!) - I guess that this prevented unwanted rear reflections by breaking up the flat surface. For similar reasons it is not a good idea to position a large TV screen between the speakers, as seems to be popular judging by other system photos I’ve seen on the web.
My partners are an Esoteric F-3a and TAD ME 1 