AKM factory fire

Will Jason review his recent decision of killing the Modi MB? Or, maybe speeding up the “Modius MB” project? :smiley:

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Who’s to say? I imagine if the chips get back in to regular production the Modi MB is still done.

The do likely have a succesor in the wings.

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Some interesting tidbits from an article I read in Stereonet.
:
“Nobeoka plant is solely responsible for DAC and ADC products…”

“Global supplies of the following DAC chips have been confirmed as affected: AK4332, AK4331, AK4432, AK4382, AK4385, AK4373, AK4396, AK4431, AK4456, AK4490, AK4493, AK4495 series - as well as the following being reported as ‘potentially affected’: AK5384, AK5385, AK5386, AK5397, AK5534 series.”

Interesting that the 32-bit AKM AK4499EQ DAC with 768kHz sampling capability is not listed. That’s a chip Anthem is going to use in its flagship AVM 90 AV Processor.

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"Re AKM: yep, it’s a problem. But I don’t think you have to worry about us too much.

Yes, the fragmented information we’re getting indicates that AKM will be out of the high-end DAC and SPDIF receiver chip business for a long time (some say 1 year, don’t take this as gospel.) And yep, we use a lot of AKM DACs and ADCs. Modi, Modius, Fulla, Hel are all pretty AKM-centric. But…we’re also pretty paranoid about stocking. Thank Alex for that. So, we’re good for about 6 months.

Beyond that, we are in touch with AKM to see if we can bridge the gap, but of course they have other things to worry about right now, so we don’t have answers. Also, they may not have any certainty about what they’ll be able to deliver for a long time either. So, I am working with Mike, Ivana, and Dave on both mid-term and long-term alternatives to ensure we are not caught out like this again, and so we can continue to build our small, affordable DAC line. We’ll see what comes of this.

One thing’s for sure, this certainly puts a boot through our cancellation of Modi Multibit. Out of an abundance of caution, Modi Multibit gets a reprieve for the foreseeable future. So something good has come of this…

…this entire, crazy year." ~ Jason Stoddard

https://www.superbestaudiofriends.org/index.php?threads/schiity-rumors-and-sbaf-talks-about-mcdonalds.5246/page-48#post-323594

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Cancellation of cancellation (of Modi MB). Interesting.

Can you imagine the little Modi MB skyrocketting in sales after this episode? That would be ironically fun.

It seems inflation is still lagging behind the entry level world – having an :eye: for the Liquid Spark DAC (competition). I was planning to pay 80 bucks for it in the holiday sales but I’m not confident it will happen. Hey, I’m not in a rush here. Magni/Modi stack is still alive and kicking. Just want to hoard more 100 bucks (component-wise) stacks. :smile:

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The other Schiit MB DACs use AKM receivers and (I believe) other AKM chips for more than the D/A. Like for toslink and stuff. So it’s not just their DS dacs that may be affected.

I assume the same is true for many other DAC OEMs.

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I remember 10+ years ago when a hop distributor had a warehouse fire.that destroyed a portion of the annual US hop production. The downstream effects changed craft beer for years.

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There’s a man with perspective and a strong center.

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I don’t know about “quickly.” Yield/quality control is fab-dependent, it takes some serious work for a contract fab to reach target quality on a particular mask set. They may also not have the test equipment needed ready to go and with trained personnel, DACs are not just digital.

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