I’m curious why not 
The Vivaldi is still among the best of the best. The updates across the years, including the Apex board has enabled it to maintain that leadership. Given a good deal, why wouldn’t you upgrade to a Vivaldi? What do you believe sounds better?
It is not because I believe there is something which sounds better. My opinion is simply predicated by my belief that a 12 year old product will, in all likelihood, be replaced within the next year or two.
I prefer to wait for the replacement…which hopefully will also include a two box (instead of three) option. It will also be welcome to have the new cabling system - eliminating another inconvenience.
A Varese light (ie Vivaldi replacement) with the Core, single box Stereo DAC, and optional clock - all connected by the new Actus cabling system - would be right up my alley. No touch screen user interface required 
Fair enough, but in my view, the Varèse is the Vivaldi replacement - previous flagship replaced by a new flagship. There may be new elements introduced to make that upgrade more palatable, but there won’t be a “Varèse-lite” Vivaldi replacement. dCS’ history of flagship platforms validates that view.
Instead, in the same way that the Rossini was a trickle-down of the Vivaldi, I think we’re more likely to see a 2-box Rossini replacement using Varèse technology. Would make more sense I think, and much broader addressable market.
Could also end up with:
$$$$ Varèse
$$$ Bonzo Dog (Vivaldi-ish money, three boxes)
$$ Ween (Rossini-ish money, two boxes)
$ Lina
I’d not be surprised if the Bartok’s use cases and price points were largely replaced by the Lina. And the Lina is already a bit in keeping with the Varèse visually.
Would be very happy if I could buy a new dCS Ween in a few months/years. And I’d be even happier if I could do it with the Varèse Clock instead of the Ween Clock 
In fact, it’ll be soooo interesting to see which boxes get consolidated as you move down the line in price.
If Varese is the Vivaldi replacement then dCS is asking current totl Vivaldi owners to jump from $100k to 250k. I imagine they are going to lose several customers along the way. On the flip side I imagine they are hoping for new ones in exchange.
As a former Linn Klimax DS owner I remember the grumblings when Linn introduced the new chassis Klimax DS 3 years ago (?) and took the price from $25k to $40k. “Chump” change compared to Varese 
Strictly repeating pure gossip - there was a post on the WBAF forum from someone “claiming” to be in the know stating dCS were encouraged to hit this price point by their “partners”. It seems they wanted a source component to match the price point of the Relentless amplifiers and Chronosync speakers. Oh - and I guess Transparent Magnum Opus cables as well. The poster stated the Vivaldi was way to cheap to partner with the other equipment. Once again - simply recounting something read on another forum.
I also think the price jump between Vivaldi and Varese is prohibitive to perhaps quite a number of current Vivaldi owners. And that at the current Vivaldi price point which is hugely higher then when it was introduced.
If your last statement out of WBF is anywhere near correct it wouldn’t actually surprise me given the state and direction of the market for high end, but I do feel somewhat irked that a product is marketed this way, by price exclusivity. The relation between quality and price is stretched to the point of nearly breaking and the product is placed out of reach of a lot of would-be consumers so that it can be bought by luxury lifestyle consumers with too much money only to be gathering dust somewhere or hopefully sold on for less than half of retail so enthusiasts might be able to use it.
The speakers I own had a somewhat similar fate, I believe they were too cheap initially to compete in the American market at around 12-15k, so then they were raised to 20k new just so buyers would consider them. At least some suggestions for that can be found apart from inflation.
A couple notes I took from the webinar held 13 August.
DSD256 in existing products, hardware can support it, the bottleneck is on the network card (and interfaces in general), we may start with the USB interface. dCS have limited R&D resources, we don’t think there is a lot of DSD256, DSD512 content out there, so we previously focused on e.g. Expanse, APEX. But it’s on the roadmap and it will likely be offered via a staged availability.
30 metres of length certified for ACTUS, looking at going up to 100 metres.
L/B/R/V products remain valid. There is a roadmap for current products.
Mosaic updates coming. We want to make sure to provide upgrade paths. We need to have Varese in the hands of customers to then help inform our product roadmap. There are a number of different ways how we can support existing owners but need to see more feedback from the new Varese architecture.
Everything is IP addressable in Varese.
Unused slots on Core, working on HDMI but a fast moving, tricky interface, no date on it.
Working on backwards compatibility, could run without clock, without user interface (headless), will be shared in future.
That is probably true. I had a chat with David Steven’s late father many years ago on the pressure he underwent to have more expensive products in certain markets as impressive cost, not performance, was the motivating ingredient for customers. BTW,as an aside, it puts me in mind of a London dealer I knew who used product weight as a sales tool. He would thrust the product into the customer’s hands saying “Here, feel this” .
It is sometimes important to not look at the market as an audiphile and appreciate that for many customers sound is not their objective. There may be other needs that are commercially essential to meet.
Varese is very important. I don’t think it is expected to sell in pallet loads. It has limited production and a limited target audience. What is does is reinforce dCS as a technical leader ( maybe the technical leader). By buying one of the lower priced models you join the same club.
Meanwhile Vivaldi has not been replaced ( observations above of overall dCS pricing structure are correct) and when it is it will no longer be on offer for sale. For commercial reasons this must happen at some point and probably not too far away though when can only be guesswork.
And circling back to the question Anup posed to me about why I would not consider a Vivaldi upgrade from my current Rossini APEX - the quote above succinctly states my reasoning. I will simply wait it out.
dCS may have a problem if many others choose to do the same. Just saying…
Unlike Pete, I doubt it, if only because WBAF these days is mainly populated with competitive platform dealers/distributors and their partisan cheerleaders full of hyperbole
If you think about it, the price of the Varèse system is likely a reflection of the challenge in delivering a significant step function improvement in sound quality over the Vivaldi. Remains to be seen, but setting a new industry benchmark at this level can’t come cheap.
Interesting. I hadn’t heard that one.
Given the “asynchronous… error corrected… 100m” description, It definitely suggests that the ACTUS interface is likely either a 1 x 1000Base-T or 10GBase-T Ethernet (4 twisted-pairs) + 2 x dCS Tomix twisted-pairs for Clocking.
Well coming from a rossini and clock, and jumping up to the vivaldi apex dac, only cost my the cost off what it was to get my rossini apex’ed.
The difference in sound quality even after 20 seconds was enough for me.
Plus i have had a few years enjoying what the vivaldi can do, and that also is worthwhile.
We all know things will get replaced and move on, but also so will i.
We all only have a short time here and even shorter time to enjoy music when we can, so for me waiting for the next best thing is really just wasting precious time i have.
Plus when the next thing does eventually arrive, it doesn’t mean i will be able to afford it, even want it by then, or like it over what i have.
The vivaldi is already very expensive these days, and i can’t see myself changing from it. I love the way it looks, sounds, and just operates. If we get some inpovements along the way still even better.
But for anyone sitting on the fence with a rossini and wanting more, but waiting for the what if, then i say just do it, i was also thinking the same, but don’t regret making the jump for a second.
Plus the other fact is this. If it has taken a product that costs more than double to better the vivaldi, and then by how much ??? Then what are dCS going to do with a vivaldi replacement? You can’t really keep it the same cost but inpove it more, as that surely means it would be too close to the flagship, especially for the price difference. So a tricky one i feel.
Maybe the way forward is just to keep on updating the lower ranges, as really they could have had a vivaldi mk2 with the apex modification, but they chose to do it the other way and then offer it to all the models. Probably a much better financial option for dCS, and an easier way for owners to move forward.
But i like the way dCS has been, as in offering upgrades, plus free one’s, rather than the have to sell and buy a new box. I think it’s a great way, it keeps me as a customer as well.
I am just looking forward to what they come up with next.
Maybe an upgrade to the vivaldi upsampler is next ?
Maybe we will get a new map or filters as i am sure with the apex board, they also have found new inpovements there as well.
But whatever it is, i will certainly carry on enjoying my vivaldi stack, plus everyone that gets the chance to listen too it are blown away with how it sounds, and so they should be really.
Cheers dunc
WBAF is a forum I just recently started visiting due to the fact they have a DarTZeel sub forum (and I am a new DarTZeel owner😆).
I completely agree with your comments above and it is one of the reasons my previous forum, Naim, was so enjoyable. Dealers need to identify themselves and are subject to STRICT rules prohibiting the hawking of their products. I take much of what I read on WBAF with a grain of salt - for the reasons you stated above.
Hopefully Ben @all2ofme will chime in. He often told me what he thought WBAF stood for - and I always got a chuckle out of it. Can’t quite seem to remember.
This is why I remained a Linn Klimax DS owner for more than a decade (in fact I still own it as it now provides service in my headphone only system).
I attended the initial Stateside demo presented by Ivor back in 2007. I pulled the trigger and banished CD from my system in 2011 and purchased the /1 version. Since then I have upgraded with /2, /3, Organik, and now Utopik. It has been with me for 13 years and remains, other than the chassis, current and up-to-date.
Naim, unfortunately, require you to bin everything when their new product gets released.
I can’t claim ownership of the nickname, but that doesn’t mean I don’t use it:
“Buyer’s remorse forum”
I don’t get that same feeling here. Love this forum. So many good characters. Helpful, constructive, funny even.
So many questions about future of V/R … it would be nice that DCS clarify the situation. As they read us… Up to you.
Simple: because of obsolescence and support risk.
If you Are a current Vivaldi owner, of course you can take comfort in the fact that you own one of the best playback systems available.
But if you are not a dCS current owner, you are worried that you are about to drop a lot of cash on a product that appears likely to be replaced very soon. You will therefore either wait or buy a new competitive product.
dCS could potentially reduce this latter behavior by making the upgrade/replacement policy very generous for those who purchase within [1-1.5years] of a new upgrade…
I agree and have actually been quite worried about this (for dCS). Any thoughts on this short-term strategy:
(a) New Vivaldi Upsampler w improved mapping/DSP/filters
(b) New, higher accuracy Vivaldi clock
This might entice existing V/R owners to spend again and keep their existing platforms, without a full replacement…
If i thought the vivaldi clock was lacking, i would just get a master clock to feed it, i wouldn’t swap my existing clock i don’t think.
But as said above, upgrades to the upsampler is probably more reasonable to expect going forward
Affordability aside, in my view, folks who don’t take a punt will always be one-step behind in the upgrade cycle, perpetually waiting for the next model just over the horizon.
dCS products are built to last, my 24 year-old dCS 974 is a testament to that fact; when you take a look inside, you can’t tell it’s nearly quarter of a century old 
Some form of (a) possibly, keeping in mind that Filtering/Mapping currently happens within the Vivaldi DAC not the Upsampler, so any upgrade that doesn’t involve the DAC in some fashion makes little sense.
But most definitely not (b), simply because I don’t believe that’s where the main sound quality improvements will come from.
I’m with Anup on this @keiserrg. I understand your and Gregg’s position but in my mind it seems to be based on speculation (fear?) born of other companies’ commercial practices and not by dCS’s track record which very clearly shows a couple of things:
If you read the story of dCS as told by Chris Hales and Andy McHarg you will also appreciate how a couple of the early generations of dCS’s consumer products were introduced to make radical advances in areas such as industrial design and usability as they transitioned from the professional to the consumer space. And as Anup points out many key aspects of the internal architecture are unchanged or only incrementally changed since those days. In fact if you look closely the rate of change in dCS’s platforms has actually decreased as they have settled into the consumer market and the architecture has matured.
And although a few independent reviewers speak highly of products like Wadax and MSB, as do their customers (who are naturally heavily invested in them, just like we are in dCS) I have yet to see any significant evidence (critical mass of respected reviewers, objective measurements) that they have leapfrogged dCS on SQ. If and when that happens dCS will of course have to respond, either with upgrades to the current lines or with new lines (or maybe both).
So while I understand that folks might expect Vivaldi to be replaced in the imminent future, I still disagree.
In the meantime folks will vote with their wallets, either based on optics, SQ, or whatever other factors are most important to them. (Luckily) there’s always a choice!