Audio GD

heiney9

Contemplating buying an Audio GD NFB 3.1 for my office rig. Anyone know of any stateside dealer/distributors? DHL shipping is close to $60 from Audio GD direct plus they want to charge for Paypal fee's.

Thanks

H9

tonyb

Don't know about state side , I didn't want to wait either and just jumped on the first one listed on the 'gon. I have the older nfb 3, and like it, the 3.1 is suppose to be better. Also have that upgraded DIR chip in it. Do a google search and see if any pop up, I know pacific valve was carrying them for awhile.

heiney9

I've been scouring the 'net and Audiogon and Ebay, nothing but the headphone/dac amps and the upper end DAC's. I just thought if someone stateside carried them I could avoid some fee's. Pushing $400 for a piece of gear in the office rig is really too much considering the use it gets. Plus, I prefer to buy used for the office rig rather than new.

I will order the DIR 9001 chip also, if I decide to go with a new one.

H9

tonyb

Ooops, that was Pacific audio, not Pacific valve, sorry about that. Anyway, keep a looking, used ones will pop up.

heiney9

Pacific Audio has free shipping but I doubt that's for US customers.

H9

tonyb

I saw a few headphone/dac/pre on the bay. One is only 135 clams, the other has 7 days left at 22 bucks right now. Whats wrong with a can/dac for an office rig ? Not bad for the price of admission plus you could get a feel for the sound and resell it if some other one comes up.

heiney9

Compromise, because it has a headphone amp in it. The one for $22 retails for $749 so I am not hopeful that will go cheap. The other one is the Sparrow I believe, there is no analog output other than the headphone jack. No line out's

Plus I'm trying to get something better than I have and get the most performance for my $$$.

H9

sucks2beme

Pacific valve pretty much dumped the whole audio-gd lineup.
That was really the only place in the US to get one. I waited around and found a
nfb-3 at a great price. It's either that or drop the coin and order one.
They don't come up often.

falconcry72

heiney9 wrote: »

DHL shipping is close to $60 from Audio GD direct plus they want to charge for Paypal fee's.

Thanks

H9

When I ordered my Digital Interface (with external power supply), they quoted me $43 for DHL and $33 for EMS. I ended up going EMS, and it arrived extremely fast... like 3 business days or some **** like that. See if they'll give you an EMS quote.

zingo

I've ordered from Audio-GD twice, and I thought the shipping time and cost was reasonable, although not low. However, I would do it again as they make great products.

tonyb

sucks2beme wrote: »

Pacific valve pretty much dumped the whole audio-gd lineup.
That was really the only place in the US to get one. I waited around and found a
nfb-3 at a great price. It's either that or drop the coin and order one.
They don't come up often.

Thats the one I have, I was lucky to find one from a reviewer for an audio magazine, paid 250 shipped to my door with less than 40 hours of use on it so it was like new. How do you like yours ? Have the DIR chip in it ?

audiocr381ve

I'm pretty sure the NFB-3.1 will be my next DAC.

Hopefully one pops up so we can get a good review out of you Brock

audiocr381ve

tonyb wrote: »

Thats the one I have, I was lucky to find one from a reviewer for an audio magazine, paid 250 shipped to my door with less than 40 hours of use on it so it was like new. How do you like yours ? Have the DIR chip in it ?

Lucky ****!

tonyb

audiocr381ve wrote: »

Lucky ****!

Hey now, the only person allowed to call me a **** is....well....another ****.:cheesygrin:

heiney9

audiocr381ve wrote: »

I'm pretty sure the NFB-3.1 will be my next DAC.

Hopefully one pops up so we can get a good review out of you Brock

If nothing else, once Uncle Sam gives me my money they have been holding for me all year, I'll probably just buy new. Which goes against my secondary rig philosophy.

H9

audiocr381ve

heiney9 wrote: »

If nothing else, once Uncle Sam gives me my money they have been holding for me all year, I'll probably just buy new. Which goes against my secondary rig philosophy.

H9

Hehe, LOVE that you have a second rig philosophy.

tonyb wrote: »

Hey now, the only person allowed to call me a **** is....well....another ****.:cheesygrin:

:cheesygrin:

sucks2beme

tonyb wrote: »

Thats the one I have, I was lucky to find one from a reviewer for an audio magazine, paid 250 shipped to my door with less than 40 hours of use on it so it was like new. How do you like yours ? Have the DIR chip in it ?

Almost the same thing here. It was over at head-fi. Student that got in over his head with $$$.
Not a lot of hours, $252 to my doorstep. They seem to come up there more often than Audiogon.
It sounds good for what I paid for it. I had a little headamp Pico before that's USB powered.
As expected, the weak point of the Pico was bass. A real power supply and analog section
does wonders to improve that. But the Pico performs pretty good for what it is. If you needed it to be portable, that's the one to have.
The nfb-3 can be a bit tricky to get set up with windows. I have it set up for best sound, which for me
was at the same rate as the files-44.1 16 bit. It bypasses the windows sound mixer.

The other one that I looked at was the Arcam rdac with async usb. There was a seller with cheap
refurbs and free shipping. He may still be out there. The Rega was just too expensive for the budget right
now.

FTGV

Since it's an office rig I assume USB will the primary input?

heiney9

Yes Fred, USB.

I found a Stello DA100 for a really good price, but can't get the seller to respond. It's actually a bit low so I am suspicious.

H9

FTGV

The DA100 looks like a solid choice,very nicely put together(love the neat PC board layout.)Have you considered the Music Hall like your bud Rich uses?Lot's of potential for tweaking via tube and opamp rolling and while not async. uses a respectable USB reciever chip.

heiney9

The Music Hall is very nice and with your tutoring Rich did a fantastic job w/the upgrades. I;ll be heading to his place to hear it at the end of the month. It's out of my price range for the office rig. I'd like to stay around $300-350. The gentleman selling the Stello (Ricardo had one and it was very nice) is asking $300 for it, which seems low, but he won't respond to any of my contacts.

H9

tonyb

sucks2beme wrote: »

A real power supply and analog section
does wonders to improve that.

Yep, been preaching that forever.

Can you or Brock school me on why people use USB over coax digital ? For the most part, it seems every review I read, the coax connection is prefered. There are a few exceptions though with one being the Tranquility dacs which are built for USB. Is it just one less conversion in the process ? What other benefits are there ?

thsmith

tonyb wrote: »

Yep, been preaching that forever.

Can you or Brock school me on why people use USB over coax digital ? For the most part, it seems every review I read, the coax connection is prefered. There are a few exceptions though with one being the Tranquility dacs which are built for USB. Is it just one less conversion in the process ? What other benefits are there ?

One reason is if you are using a computer as a music server there will be no coax in most cases, not Macs anyway so its either USB or optical.

sucks2beme

usb is the connection of choice for pc users. Hopefully the new usb3 standard will catch fire and
take us past the limitations of usb 2. Either way, I don't have anything higher than cd quality, so
USB works fine. I tried running a cdp tied with coax to it, and also ran the same music from the pc
using usb. Switching back and forth, I didn't hear a difference, so usb for me works fine. I believe
the differences may be more pronounced at 96/24. That's about the point usb peters out.

heiney9

tonyb wrote: »

Yep, been preaching that forever.

Can you or Brock school me on why people use USB over coax digital ? For the most part, it seems every review I read, the coax connection is prefered. There are a few exceptions though with one being the Tranquility dacs which are built for USB. Is it just one less conversion in the process ? What other benefits are there ?

For me it's simple, the newer computers don't come with a soundcard that has a digital output. Rather than buy another soundcard, which really isn't the best way to go, you use the USB output. If set-up properly with a decent dac (asynchronous is one feature to look at) I think it's actually a better way to get digital output.

Coax shouldn't be preferred digital output of the computer. The USB is a better way to get digital out of the computer environment, but then the sound is only as good as the dac you are using.

H9

tonyb

I get all that, but since so many USB/ digital converters are on the market, kinda makes it a mute point no ?

falconcry72

heiney9 wrote: »

...The USB is a better way to get digital out of the computer environment, but then the sound is only as good as the dac you are using.

H9

In my experience, I have found this to be exactly true. My first attempt at PC-based HIFI included an onboard sound card. It's one of the best cards on the market, but its SPDIF output (both coaxial and toslink) does not sound quite as good as any of the USB>SPDIF converters I've used since.

The best PC-based audio I've heard is either:

1. hard-wired with asynchronous USB, or
2. wireless with a squeezebox touch

As H9 mentioned, the sound is going to be greatly dependent on the DAC, which is why, for the hard-wired method, I like standalone USB>SPDIF converters, so you can use any number of non-USB DAC's, which opens up your options, especially on the used market.

tonyb

falconcry72 wrote: »

As H9 mentioned, the sound is going to be greatly dependent on the DAC, which is why, for the hard-wired method, I like standalone USB>SPDIF converters, so you can use any number of non-USB DAC's, which opens up your options, especially on the used market.

That's my thought, your better at getting down to the point better than I am. Options, why limit yourself to USB ?

marvda1

would this work?
http://shop.grantfidelity.com/Grant-Fidelity-TubeDAC-11-D-A-Converter.html

heiney9

marvda1 wrote: »

would this work?
http://shop.grantfidelity.com/Grant-Fidelity-TubeDAC-11-D-A-Converter.html

Yes it would, but I've heard the exact same thing under the Maverick brand and it's was than stellar sounding to me.

Thanks for the suggestion.

At this point I'm just as confused as I was a year ago because there are sooooooooooooo many choices and I really need to stay within budget.

Now I'm back to considering an MHdt or this

http://www.ebay.com/itm/FIRESTONE-SPITFIRE-DAC-BRAVO-usb-spdif-interface-re-clocker-SUPPLIER-PSU-/330670517128?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4cfd7fab88

I really want discrete and not op-amps but not sure that can happen in my price range.

H9

heiney9

Audiogon has an NFB-12 Dac/headphone amp that will work. It retails for $200 and the guy is asking $340 and throwing in some cables. I had to ask him why he thinks this worth so much. I'd offer him $150 for the NFB-12 and forget the cables. We'll see what he says. I'd actually pay up to $175 for it, but I'm not paying retail or more for a used piece.

H9