R2R dac vs. Delta Sigma type dac

It arrived. The guy didn't tell me he owns Midwest Audio in Indiana. Jason Walker is who I've been dealing with.

https://www.stereophile.com/content/welcome-midwest-audio

H9

I have a Roon Nucleus One server. I haven't had a chance to really get into it yet. Thanks for the information. Once I get settled with the sound "as is", I will definitely be experimenting with the DSD engine and oversampling. I will be somewhat limited because of the constraints of the Nucleus One and its processing power.

The NO only does USB.

With these specs I feel the Cyan 2 is pretty future proof.

PCM 44.1-1.536M (32bit)

DSD 64-512X （DOP)

DSD 64-1024X （Native)

The Nucleus One I believe has a max DSD (DOP) of DSD256. I am just learning and figuring it all out at this point. I'm just a noob when it comes to this OS and DSD stuff.

H9

Ok, for those that think everything sounds the same or mostly similar enough to not detect differences. Especially those that think double blind testing is valid in audio; I encountered a scenario last few days that confirms to me that I can hear even the slightest differences with my gear, playing my familiar music, in my familiar listening position.

Those last 3 points are critical as many double blind tests have a bunch of people in an unfamiliar setting, with unfamiliar gear in an unfamiliar listening position w/inadequate listening time.

The past 2-3 days I have been giving the office rig a work out. I am now very familiar with the (NOS) FiiO Warmer r2r dac, as well as the Burson Vivid 6 op-amps in the Keces HA-171. Awhile back, maybe 10-12 days ago I flipped the switch on the dac to OS - over sampling to get an idea what that sounded like. I wasn't overly impressed initially and after one other listening session (in OS) I started using the main rig to demo the Holo Audio Cyan 2 r2r dac.

Over the past 2-3 days I fired up the office rig and was listening to that exclusively. As I am listening, something seems off. The width of the soundstage has narrowed slightly, the space around instruments had shrunk and the superbly "live" vocals and texture of vocals and acoustic music was just not there. Something had changed, something was missing.........

More like 2.5D presentation than 3D. Even cymbals lacked the realism and decay I came to love about this dac. My first thought was to blame the JJ tubes, time to roll in the Amperex BB's apparently.

Evening before last my computer restarted itself and last night I had a helluva time trying to sync Roon and the FiiO dac. After Google searching, one of the recommendations was to check to see if it was in OS mode. Windows and the USB driver fight each other (something about the sampling rate out of sync) I shrugged it off forgetting that I did indeed, a week and half ago, switch to OS mode for a demo.

Finally, I checked all the connections and looked at the back of the Warmer r2r and it indeed was set to OS. All my listening up to this point has been NOS (non-oversampling). Meaning I had become intimately familiar with all the subtleties of much of my "go to" music. Those familiar subtleties were missing and my brain and my trained ear picked up on it. This is how I know "everything matters".

After switching back to OS mode, the unit's synced up and the familiar sound points I was missing were back again. I really can't believe there is such a difference. Training ourselves to listen for certain things that make the experience rewarding and our brains interpreting these things are what it's all about.

This experience (or experiment) cannot be relegated to a couple hour blind a/b/x test with unfamiliar methods and expect any sort of outcome than can be relied upon as evidence. It's take me months of listening to the same tracks to pick up and distinguish subtitles within my listening ritual that cannot be duplicated casually to determine an outcome. We all have our own set of expectations when we sit down to listen to various pieces of gear. There are certain attributes that are non-negotiable to me when I demo gear or upgrades, etc. But those attributes or expectations are different for all of us.

It's not impossible to assume everything matters. Only if you know what to listen for, use your expectations, apply the attributes you find appealing about this hobby to every piece of gear that you get your ears on. This helps decide what's best for you, in your listening space, with your gear, with your ears and your expectations/non-negotiable attributes that make a listening session highly rewarding to you personally.

Didn't expect to write this much, but I was thrilled to discover my "mistake" and now I'm a happy camper again. Once again proving "everything matters"

H9

The system you have should be very well suited to an R2R dac. Perhaps this "particular" one wasn't for you. Hardly seemed up to the pedigree of the rest of your gear. Perhaps you'll give a higher end R2R dac a try some day.
I have a lower end unit $399 retail and a higher end unit $1600.............they do sound markedly different. I use them in different rigs. Rigs that are appropriately matched for similar performance. However neither sound as you describe.

IMHO, you hardly gave it any time (not break in) but listening time. Personally I could never fully evaluate any piece of gear in the short time you did.

H9