I’ve not seen, nor heard, anything that suggests Chord’s DACs or DAC/amps have anything that would resemble euphonic (or other audible) distortion. While their designer has some interesting theories and ideas, as well as approaches to implementation, the end results measure as cleanly, and as close to an objective ideal, as any other state-of-the-art DAC out there (irrespective of price).
Not that this changes your overall point, it’s just not a good example of it.
The Audio-GD stuff, well - the recent stuff anyway (R2R11, NFB28.XX) - that not only measures poorly (the worst numbers I’ve seen for any audio product), but does so in ways and at a level that definitely intrude into the audible range, even without playing at hearing-damaging levels and without managing to be euphonic either. It certainly makes their stuff easy to differentiate in blind comparisons (though not in anyway I could personally say is “good” … other’s may like it).
And then, and this is not a response to you just a general comment based on @Anonimar’s … basing one’s purchasing audio decisions off a single measurement is missing the forest for the trees even for a hardcore objectivist. The actual graphs are a lot more informative and tell you a lot more about the things performance than “this one number is the biggest”.
I have indeed seen some suggest that Chord’s unique implementation has a euphonic impact, but am happy to drop it as an example. They perhaps didn’t know what they were talking about.
[I won’t edit my post or it’ll make the response unclear.]
Oh, no doubt … people claim all sorts of things … but in the case of Chord, it’s certainly not the manufacturer or the designer making claims about euphony nor extolling the virtues of design/implementation decisions that are known to cause issues.
I wasn’t really trying to be “corrective” though.
Something I find interesting is that Rob Watts will talk about listening tests in which he hears meaningful differences, and that guiding his designs (or final choices), but he still uses measurements pretty heavily (look at any of the presentations he has online for example) - and they’re pretty much state of the art.
Though sometimes what he says he’s hearing, and where he says that comes from (in the measurements), is at such low levels that it’s either a genuine breakthrough in expanding our knowledge of how sound is processed in the brain that more people (engineers) need to pay attention to, or it’s utter nonsense.
I don’t want to start a needless objective vs. subjective debate - but considering I purchased the thx 789 because of how well it measures for its price point - it would seem contradictory to ignore measurements for the DAC portion as well.
To be honest, if I didn’t have the Monoprice 788 Desktop, I’d have already joined the drop. At this point, I’d rather just wait for THX’s next rev or save up for a Benchmark and keep the bragging rights.
I honestly dont need it. I’m pretty content with the RME ADI-2 DAC as an amp, but we’ll see when the ZMF Verite arrives if it’s sufficient. I am also getting the Woo Fireflies next week for a tube amp option. I don’t know what to do with the two THX amps at this point. May keep one and sell off the other, or bring the Monolith model to work to use, although I have been only using IEMs and BT ANC headphones at work lately. If we re-arrange our seating arrangement a little bit, then I may go back to using better quality over-ear closed backs again.
Hmm that’s a toughie. I get what you’re saying, though, since once you have the 789, that in tandem with the RME basically renders the Monolith redundant.
I’d say keep whichever you prefer and sell the other. Can’t remember…did you do the XLR mod on the Monolith?
Yep, that’s what I was getting at. Monolith + RME is basically doubling up on processing power for (at best) minimal benefit or (realistically) too much processing power.
Lol look at us looking out for each other. We just instinctively know to come here and say “drop’s back,” regardless of whether we plan to join ourselves. Love this community.
Also looks like this is a 1,000-unit preorder. I’m honestly surprised it’s lasted as long as it has. I imagine Drop not sending out emails as soon as it was open (and instead relying on word-of-mouth/smoke signals) is a contributor.
Price went up a bit too. $400.00, plus $25.00 shipping to Canada. So that is $575.00 in Canuck bucks, plus 15% tax. The tax grab is hit and miss, but more likely at this price point. That is $661.25. While I am curious about the now legendary 789, I am not that curious.
In the last several weeks I have seen two pairs of used headphones on CAM (Canuck Audio Mart): The CFA Cascades (only lasted one day) and the Focal Elex. Both were $700.00 and both are on my wish list. If I was to spend that kind of money right now, I think I would get more out of it on headphones as I already have an amp that I am Very happy with right now.
I had been hoping to land it around $500.00. Naive on my part.
Looking forward to reading all the feedback about it when they land in September.
I sold mine on CAM in December for $400 CDN after only having it for a week. It was a local pickup but it appears that the guy who bought it got a great deal!
At the time I also had the Gilmore Lite MK2 and quite honestly I preferred it, although I sold that in order to fund my purchase of the SPL Phonitor X. I had bought mine used but a friend of mine just bought one directly from HeadAmp for $450 US, free shipping. He asked that the package be marked at a lower declared value, $100 I think and as such only paid $33 CDN in taxes, duty, etc. The other thing to keep in mind is that products made in the US like ZMF and MrSpeakers headphones, Schiit and HeadAmp products, etc. are eligible for preferential tariff treatment under the NAFTA. Many small outfits don’t know this so you have to ask them to provide a declaration on the customs form stating: “I hereby certify that the good covered by this shipment qualifies as an originating good for purposes of preferential tariff treatment under the NAFTA.” MrSpeakers, Schiit and ZMF have done this for me so I did not pay any import duty on their products, although I did have to pay sales tax.
I don’t know what province you live in but if you don’t live in BC and you purchase a product online from Headphone Bar, for example, you will only pay 5% federal sales tax and avoid the provincial sales tax.
I have bought from The Headphone Bar and paid 15% tax. According to the law, you pay the tax chargeable to where you are sending it. And if that province has a “harmonized” sales tax, that is what you charge. Sometimes you get lucky though with MassDrop or even Amazon.
I assume the tax is part of it and if I get lucky, I just do my little happy dance.
Shane D
PS: No breaks with Schiit. I missed the mailman, but I have a note saying that I owe $40.00 on top of my 228.00 ( Canadian) for my Loki.
PPS: those amps are going to be in high demand in the used market. I would guess a Minimum of $400.00 in Canada going forward.
Ah, I guess because I live in Quebec where we don’t have a harmonized sales tax - federal and provincial sales tax are charged separately - and because BC also doesn’t have an HST, all of the products I have purchased from Headphone Bar have only been charged 5% federal sales tax, which is part of the reason I try to buy from them.
