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RE: Audioquest Dragonfly 1.2 - My early experiences

Posted by soundchekk (A) on April 17, 2014 at 01:36:48

In Reply to: RE: Audioquest Dragonfly 1.2 - My early experiences posted by Bob_C on April 16, 2014 at 14:29:05:

I like the PCM5102 DACs very much.
However. It's not about the DAC chip itself. What matters first of all is the actual usb interface implementation and the power supplies and not to forget the firmware/driver.

The JLsound interface sounds worse then the Dragonfly 1.2, if buspowered.

That changed when I activated its isolation and reclocking features.
But that requires two different external 5V sources. I used 5V batteries that are usually used to recharge your phones/tablets.

In this case the jlsounds interface sounds cleaner and more dynamic then the Dragonfly (buspowered). It'll develop more air around the instruments. This gets obvious on complex music (orchestra).

But for a buspowered device the Dragonfly performs pretty well.
That applies also to the M2Tech USB DAC.

The SPDIF output of the 99€ jlsounds interface can IMO compete with Audiophilleo+battery supply (that we compared at a friends place).

For sure the Dragonfly 1.2 is a very attractive Plug'n Play interface.
A pity that the dated interface chip is used (but that's understandable
from a Gordon Rankin perspective)

In general I'm more then happy that nowadays it won't take more than 100-200$ to achieve IMO real quality sound. (A friend of mine just replaced his NAD M51 with a 25$ chinese PCM5102DAC + 50$ newest XMOS USB interface)

Basically. With a micro computer such as Raspberry/Cubitruck/beagleboard etc plus such a DAC you'll outclass the good old Squeezebox Touch and most other PC based solutions out there.

Cheers

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Edits: 04/17/14 04/17/14 04/17/14

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