Schiit Yggdrasil Stereophile Review + Measurements

Discussion in 'Digital: DACs, USB converters, decrapifiers' started by purr1n, Jan 20, 2017.

  1. TheIceman93

    TheIceman93 El pato-zorro

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    I really need to train my ears more to hear these D/S vs Multibit differences. I have heard some bad DACs but I've also heard some very good D/S DACs, outperforming my Modi Multibit but at a considerable price increase. What Schiit is doing in unheard of in this industry for the most part and I think that most headphiles believe that they are the kings of bang for your buck. Still, I think there are other products out there that don't get demoed enough around here.

    I come from the photography world and on forums, 8 times out of 10, people push Canon or Nikon to those seeking recommendations. Leica and Hasselblad are like Ayre or MSB, only for those who like burning money for warmth. But there other companies making good cameras that excel in some areas that Nikon and Canon fail. Fujifilm, Olympus, Panasonic, Ricoh, Sigma, Pentax, Mamiya, Sony. Maybe their cameras are not as "technically good" as the two titans but they are interesting, they have flavor and charm.

    I honestly wish there were more headfi publications out there so we could get reviews for more obscure offerings. When people review with their own wallets, 8 times out of 10, they will go with a safe choice. There are probably 50 Jotenheim and Modi Multibit reviews on the Headfi thread at this point while other interesting DACs and Amps have been heard by one or two people, if they've been heard at all.
     
  2. lm4der

    lm4der A very good sport - Friend

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    I'm not sure I followed that. What are you saying here?
     
  3. k4rstar

    k4rstar Britney fan club president

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    In the second paragraph he's saying unless you blind test DS vs Multibit you can't say DS doesn't exhibit emotional response due to inherent bias.

    The first paragraph meant... who the f**k knows.
     
  4. Stride

    Stride Facebook Friend

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    He is saying he only enjoys listening when he is in the mood to listen.
     
  5. Hrodulf

    Hrodulf Prohibited from acting as an MOT until year 2050

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    Gut is weak, eyelids heavy... Pardon the last entry, it was sort of a drunkpost. I won't delete it, because I still kinda agree with it. I agree about the Mytek experience, haven't heard the said device, but I'm familiar with Sabre glare. I have a buddy who jumped on the TPA Buffalo bandwagon, once that went on. He ended up rolling every PSU, output stage there was, even bought a memory buffer. 2kEUR later the unit sounded fine, meaning that he kept the good traits (resolution and soundstage) whilst avoiding the effin glare. Then I visited him with a beaten up Parasound D/AC-1600, bypassed the MOSFET output buffer and it sounded about the same.

    I prefer the term - post-audiophile. But yeah - lately I've been a bit of a scrublord gear wise. I'll improve, I promise!
     
    Last edited: Jan 24, 2017
  6. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    My wife has the habit of listening to music on her low-buget tablet. I used to complain, jump up and down, plug it into something, or at least turn on the little bluetooth speaker. Now I just enjoy. And yes I do enjoy. That doesn't mean that there is no point in fi, hi, or mid.

    Of course this might be a
    I suspect that that is brilliant :)
     
  7. DigitalMaven

    DigitalMaven Acquaintance

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    are you abandoning any future development with delta sigma dacs? Im really enjoying the base from my 4490 bifrost and was wondering if your working on a 4497 upgrade option. By leaving my dac on 24/7 the ass tastes a little bit better and smoother. ;)
     
  8. landroni

    landroni Friend

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    Have you tried the cheaper Modi Multibit?

    In any case, D/S will always remain something of an afterthought for Schiit:
    And if you're worried about upgrades to the D/S variations, I wouldn't: Historically @baldr has come up with more upgrades to its D/S creations than to its R2R golden boys. The Modi 4490 was no doubt a firm middle finger directed at the competition who manages to put the same chip in 10x-20x more expensive products... ahem... Astell&Kern... If the over-priced clowns start rolling their 4497 contraptions, I'd bet a buck that Schiit will take a swing at it if it's not too much trouble.
     
  9. DigitalMaven

    DigitalMaven Acquaintance

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    I have speakers that love the akm 4490 chip and im worried that if I switched out the base would go tubby on me. Ive seen the specs on the new chip 4497 and thought this actually might keep up with the sonics on the multibit and keep the quality base.
     
  10. iDesign

    iDesign Almost "Made"

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  11. Armaegis

    Armaegis Friend

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  12. loplop

    loplop Acquaintance

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    I'm surprised SBAF has their panties in a bunch over a Stereophile article. I'd have thought the grizzled pirates here would have long ago decided S'phile was irrelevant in today's world; at least in the matter of actual sound quality, if not unit sales is being considered. The toasting-single-malt-and-dreaming-of-1978 is very apt for that band of misty-eyed journalists. Or maybe they just need to pay their bills and all, I mean, someone has to pay for all that excessively priced audiophilia.

    We all have to get there somehow. For me, it came about in the late 90s, after a few decades of reading the rag and trusting it as gospel. I bought the newest, most hyped class-a loudspeaker without so much as an audition. It sounded like ass. I proceeded to try to train my ears to like it for months, at which time I surrounded it with other class-a components (although I bought the Delius and not the Vivaldi as I couldnt afford the latter) and it still sounded like ass. I thought it was "me" and suffered through nearly 2 years of trying to like it, during which I nearly stopped listening to music altogether. Eventually I sold it all except the dcs DAC, which actually was quite good, used my ears to pick a new system, and cancelled my subscription.

    Funny enough, just this winter I took my turntable to get some work done by a turntable guru I've known for many decades through many audio stores. As I waited for him to work some magic, I listened to a carefully setup rig with the newest version of the very same speaker I mention above, many iterations beyond the one I owned. It still sounded like ass. There's no accounting for taste... or advertising budgets.

    In any case, JA's measurements are usually quite good, so I still look at them if I'm in the market for something new. I just skip over anything written. Do that here and there's not much controversy.

    This has been a great thread, though. Thanks to all who have posted. In particular, some years ago I was heavily involved in live recording, and I did a bunch of tests with as close to SOTA gear as I could afford. I found that 24 bit was a boon to my recording, due to the extra headroom it gave me. I generally felt that 18 or 19 bits of real musical data was what I was shooting for, as I couldn't hear anything beyond that (perhaps limited by the Delius, which wouldn't have decoded more than 20 real bits, anyway). Sampling rate made a bigger difference, to my ears, although I now believe that was more the work of the more primitive algorithms I had access to.

    Whether a drunkpost or not, @Hrodulf , I have a similar philosophy nowadays. We're all fooling ourselves with our audio, it's all a simulacrum of the real thing and it's only our brain's intervention that tricks us into believing we're close to "the truth." I'm happy folks like schiit are chasing the truth, because we all benefit from that, but the fact is none of this stuff really sounds "real." The best we can hope for is that we're tricked into thinking so... and that, in the process, we can emotionally connect with the music. Emotional state, belief structure (delta sigma vs whatever, your belief in the superiority of your system, your thoughts about the performer, etc), current health or lack thereof, all play as large of a role in your connection with the music as the actual performance of the equipment itself.

    I should get a schiit MB to listen to. I'm currently back in delta-sigma land in my headphone rig (far more utilized than my speaker rig, at my current stage of life), with ifi DACs fed with upsampled DSD. They sound good that way, and I don't think much about equipment when I'm listening. Which is a goal of mine nowadays, I'm too damn busy to care about the truth, I just want to enjoy a few hours with great music now and again. Being openly honest with myself, I'm swayed by this forum's insistence on the superiority of schiit's take in this arena to be curious enough to make a purchase. I've already bought the forum favorite HD650, might as well buy a MB schiit and see how fulla you all are. Or not. ;)

    In any case, don't be hurt by JA and stereophile's slight of a product you know sounds great. In the grand scheme of things, Stereophile's influence has waned enough to not care. Schiit is living proof.
     
  13. Grahad2

    Grahad2 Red eyes from too much anime

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    I have to say, somehow, whenever I see comments about getting a capacitor upgrade or fuse upgrade, it is bound to be accompanied with broken English, strange punctuation, and wrong capitalization. GUTB was probably the first guy I've seen to argue for strange tweaks (and stranger tiering strategies) with proper English in a long time.

    Guys my rumor may or may not happen but it's happening! Sometime!
     
  14. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    We're just feigning outrage. Besides, someone other than Arthur Salvatore needs to call them on it.
     
  15. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    Aaaaarrrrrrrgggghhhh! :eek:

    Did you have to spoil my day? ;) :D :D
     
  16. powermatic

    powermatic Friend

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    Yeah, I thought the same thing, and it hit home when a recent SBAF Zu Audio speaker thread had me look up the Stereophile specs of the Zu 'Essence' speaker, wherein JA glosses over a whole raft of crappy measurements, including both Zu's always-optimistic efficiency rating, and a -17db suckout @5k hz(!). ("Somethingsomething 'Art Dudley's ears weren't at optimum listening height' somethingsomething.") Of course Zu is an advertiser, I'm assuming Schiit is not (citation needed!) To their credit, the one (published) comment was, let's say, 'highly critical'. So there's that.:rolleyes:

    My take on the Yggdrasil review is that, on one hand JA let a wildly enthusiastic writeup of not only a mid-priced, no-dealer-network, direct-buy-only, non-advertiser (citation needed!) DAC run seemingly unedited (not to mention the reviewer's love for essentially the entire Schiit line), but on the other hand felt he had to offer some criticism to placate his advertisers. JA will wildly deny this (see many instances in AudioAsylum Critic's Corner). YCMV

    http://www.stereophile.com/content/zu-essence-loudspeaker-measurements#MrIc2FkZz3Tx2dXQ.97
     
  17. Dino

    Dino Friend

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    Schiit has had a full page ad in the last several Stereophiles.
     
  18. powermatic

    powermatic Friend

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    Thanks man! Glad I left that wide open for correction, though I'm guessing it throws my whole theory into disarray/invalidation? ;) I still think there's a germ of truth somewhere in there (citation needed!).
     
  19. Grahad2

    Grahad2 Red eyes from too much anime

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    If you'd just search...
     
  20. Dino

    Dino Friend

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    I thought it was a good post, anyway @powermatic. Schiit products/pricing certainly rock the boat for most of Stereophile's advertisers, regardless.
     

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