Lovely setup, Rob. The Pass amps have always made me grin. Via ears and eyes.
Erno’s right about the thread (probably) having most of what you need, aside from a few days or weeks of your own ears trying the experiments a few of us did.
One thing I’m confident in is that for me it took very special preamps (Pass XP-30 or Townshend Allegri Reference) — and the DAC at 6V — to better a direct dCS to XA60.8 connection.
Another is that the improvements that you can get from adding a preamp might also be possible to add in other ways (@PaleRider adding even better clocking, for example).
Hope you’re near some helpful dealers or don’t mind a lot of reading and wallet-driven experimentation
Rob has a Bartok. Unfortunately Bartok has no connectivity for a reference clock which is what @PaleRider has added . This opportunity only comes with Vivaldi wordclock.So it requires Vivaldi wordclock plus a rubidium reference clock of laboratory standard. IMO that would be gilding the lilly somewhat where resources should be better spent on the main story i.e moving to the next grade up of DAC.
However he could add a Rossini clock but as discussed many times here that is debatable economically as the total then reaches a price close to Rossini DAC which would outperform the Bartok/Rossini clock combo.
I think it is sometimes necessary to remember that Bartok is dCS’ entry level DAC/streamer and that to achieve its price point some bells and whistles have been omitted. No matter what extras one adds it cannot be made into a Rossini or Vivaldi despite its excellence otherwise.
Excellent advice Pete. I think its is always best to spend/save/budget one’s audio investment to the next best sound improvement of greatest magnitude. In digital, that will almost always be the best DAC one can afford. But even before then, we all know the drill: transducers will define the sound of a system more than any other element.
As I once wrote to Charlie Hanson ( Ayre) ; loudspeakers make the greatest change to the sound of the system, front end components to the music it makes.
Charlie liked that enough to ask me if it could use it in the future. Sadly he was taken from us before he had the chance.
Bang on. I think the (sometimes very questionable) calculations change sometimes when you’re buying second-hand/demo kit, though. And when you’re already resigned to future wallet-flagellation.
For me, that’s meant:
a demo Vivaldi Clock at only a bit more money than a new Rossini Clock. Sold. (One day I’ll compare the Vivaldi Clock to a Rossini Clock. I’ve heard from one person who did this that the improvements were worthwhile.)
sticking with my Bartók to see what happens with future firmware upgrades, and with new additions to the dCS range. It sounds fantastic — especially with the Clock — and I have a rather good (and heavily-used) headphone output for free.
Oh. That’s a much less cryptic angle than I was expecting
The Antigone is a “power management system” from DR Acoustics that I took a punt on. It’s turned out to be one of only two pieces of power equipment I’ve tried (I’m sure there are others, of course) that didn’t have an adverse effect on my system in some way. Normally dynamics, as so many people seem to say of power devices. It’s been especially good for me as it keeps everything on one shared ground out of a single wall socket.
My wife teases me relentlessly about it — it’s unattractive enough as it is (what were they thinking with that name across the front?), so she suggests that it will be “so much better when you find the button to make the ‘Antigone’ pulse in time with the music!”
Hi Ben, thank you for your feedback, I will check Emo‘s thread in detail. Yeah, volume control has always been a BIG factor influencing overall sound. Actually I am a huge fan of shortest possible signal path. Years ago I had a Pass Labs XA30.5 directly driven by a Benchmark DAC 1 USB connected to a PC. Already back then, I reduced Benchmark‘s output by internal jumper -30dB, switched Benchmark to fixed output (no volume control) and controlled volume in PC‘s foobar control. This way I had only minimal digital degradation of signal within last 20% below max. volume setting in foobar player…
Yeah, loudspeakers in my case Paradigm Persona B, are very revealing, but at the same time very recognising, if setup is of top grade. That is why I was even thinking of adding a tube-preamp like Ear Yoshino 868 to add some midrange-juice to the sound. But I am unsure, if tube-benefits justified the disadvantages like lower resolution, higher distortion etc
I think that if you are only thinking about the figures then maybe this would not be the way to go. For a tube preamplifier the 868 actually measures very well. I would propose that the levels of distortion, for example, are such that they would be effectively inaudible given the harmonic spectrum associated with tubes . But , yes, you may feel that better specs are preferable for you than my personal conclusion this preamp offers of a more palpable rendition of the recording than direct connection. However ultimately I come from a position of caring more about the artistic end result than from a purely traditional hi-fi position. That doesn’t mean that I ignore specs but that I am mainly concerned where these become inadequate rather than their necessarily having to represent a state of the art figure.
Hi Pete, I read in this forum that the Bartók is supposed to sound best at 6V output into the preamp. Since I am interested in the Ear 868, I was wondering, if you would had to reduce the Bartóks output to 0,2V since the input sensitivity of Ear 868 is 0,2V input Leads to 1,0V output which almost matches the input voltage of my Pass Labs XA 60.8 amps (26 dB gain at 1,1V). Please share your experience, thank you. Best, Rob
A quick response as I am just abou to leave for dinner with my covid support bubble.
You are overlooking the fact that Bartok will only output any of the selectable output voltages when it is processing media that is mastered at 0.0dBfs. Well mastered digital files usually leave a couple of dB in hand to avoid going into distortion so, in the main, 0.0dBfs is rarely attained. Yes I am aware of the loudness wars and inter sample overs but those are poor mastering so I do not feel a need to discuss them ( NB: not the mastering engineer’s fault. Usually his/her client is the guilt party). You will neever know ( without a meter) what the actual voltage produced by Bartok moment to moment playing actual music is.
So, in real life 2V is the appropriate voltage to use into the balanced or RCA input marked “CD” on the 868. Remember that 2V output is the ISO standard for CD and SACD players. I can assure you that the great Tim de Paravicini would have been well aware of this when he chose the sensitivities of the inputs.
That’s my Uber coming so I will pick it up tomorrow if needed.
As I sit watching the rain come down in sunny North East Yorks I’m reminded of a listening test I did with myself.
I too have a Vivaldi that feeds a Townshend Allegri Ref and on into a pr of Mark Levinson 33Hs. I use Fractal F1 throughout but changed the Balanced for single ended late last year ‘‘because I thought it sounded better’’
I will be interested to change back, based upon solid electronic theory.
And I thought apart from a Clock and upsampler the stringing it all together stuff was settled…
Nick, remember that the analogue output circuits of Vivaldi ( or other dCS DACs) are of different designs for single ended RCA or balanced XLR. This differs from many products where the single ended output is derived from one half or polarity of the balanced circuit ( why its output measures exactly half of balanced). So the reason for preferring one over the other is not exclusively down to the potential reduction in parasitic noise of a balanced connection or other theoretic considerations.
, best Rob