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In Reply to: RE: I Was going to post about exaSound E22, HQ Settings, and Jitterbug, but posted by oldmkvi on September 23, 2015 at 16:43:07
I was researching exaSound DACs several months back. I see that they recently came out with the lower cost e12 but I would probably miss the informative display offered in the e22.
I am very pleased with my Ayre QB-9 DSD with my Ayre AX-7e. You know, system synergy and such. They do sound great together but exaSound is still on my 'must try' list. It's not in the budget right now.
Oh, Steve (Mercman) did an excellent review of the e22 on Audiostream.com.
After the 'noise' settles down, please post your impressions. Thanks!
Follow Ups:
The readout on the E 22 is essential, only way to know which of the many Digital Rates is playing, to be certain. It cost $3500.
How much was your Ayre?
No Sound impressions yet, but got HQ Player going to play Natively or Upsample as high as DSD4.
I was never sure what was playing on the E12, beyond PCM our DSD.
I have a Mytek, with Internal Jumpers, to compare, up to 2X DSD,
but the exa is almost 3x more $ w/new Power Supply.
I'm also thinking of getting Paul Hynes Power Supply, almost $700.
No wonder they don't include it with the DAC!
Anyway, I need to let it play for a while before really checking it out in detail.
There is an exaSound Dashboard included with the driver, window's version. It shows file resolution. Did you use this?
I use my headphone amp for volume control and leave the dashboard set for 100%.
The Ayre QB-9 DSD shows the sample rate (44, 88, 96, 176, 192, etc.) but not bit depth (16, 24, etc). The Ayre DAC is priced at $3250 unless there was a price hike, but I bought mine lightly used for much less.
I use Audirvana Plus which will show the incoming file bit-depth and sample rate, and the outgoing bit-depth and sample rate that the DAC will receive. I normally pass 'hi-res' files at their native sample rate but upsample by a factor of 2x on my 44.1KHz CD rips. AV+ has some nice custom settings in this regard.
Custom settings to upsample 44.1KHz files only by 2x. Others are passed 'native' to the DAC with no upsampling.
In this example the incoming file is 44.1KHZ but upsampled to 88.2KHz by AV+ before being sent to the DAC.
In this case my Ayre DAC also shows 88 on it's display.
In this example the incoming file is 24/192 and is unchanged in the outgoing signal to the DAC.
The DAC also shows 192 in it's display.
So there are ways to "see" what your DAC is receiving without a display on the DAC but it's much more convenient to have it right there in the DAC screen.
I never thought of experimenting with the upsampling facility built into Audirvana. As always, thank you for another informative post.
The Ayre and the exaSound are two very different sounding DACs. You'll have to spend a good deal of money to better your Ayre.
Interesting. I'll have to read the reviews again and probably 'read between the lines' a little with my decoder ring on. Unless you care to summarize in very simplistic 'bottom line' terms that standout in your mind.
From what I gather, exaSound DACs strive to be very neutral, clean, transparent, extended. All good things, but I've read this sort of description in linestages and power amps that I bought, some of which were not so enjoyable musically to my taste.
The Ayre seems transparent and smooth to me but not at all sterile or clinical with possibly a tad bit of warmth and body. It's definitely a very pleasant sounding DAC.
Am I on the right track? ;-)
You have it right.
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