Dangerous Music Convert-2 DAC Review - Stream of Consciousness

FWIW something quirky I encountered with the XMOS drivers. (Downloaded from the Dangerous site, dated 2017)

If you power on the Convert-2 after your W10 PC is running, you get every sample rate and bit depth even if the DAC is locked in at say 44.1 with Master Mode. And it doesn't play "Master" tracks in Tidal either.

To get around this problem I just cycle through the sample rates on the Convert-2 then go back to 44.1. W10 then shows the appropriate information:



Might help some folks who run into issues with USB talking with the Convert-2.

Anyway I gotta say the Convert-2 with speakers is f'ing killer. Listened a few hours this morning turned on full blast. Yuuuuuuge effortless bold sound. Great layering, doesn't sound congested during busy passages. My HE-6 holds back what it's capable of. Only two small niggles are I'd like vocals to pop out of the mix more with a little more clarity (seems llike the center image is depressed marginally compared to the very outer left and right edges) and a tiny bit more air in the top would be ace. This is trivial compared to rest of the sound signature that is sublimely plain and natural. It has this easiness which is both clear and simple. I don't at all mean an "easygoing" sound here, but it has a straightforward punch/bite with a sweet smoothness. Sounds like a contradiction in terms, but it's an intoxicating mix of sweet and hard-hitting. I'm hearing nuances in basslines I've practically committed to memory too.

EDIT: Also nice the Convert-2 keeps the settings you have before you turn it off. It stays in Master Mode so you don't have to depress that Word Clock button every time you turn it on. Yeah, yeah "who turns off a DAC?"

 

Lack of ultimate upper air is the dangerous sound sig ime but I haven’t heard convert 2. It probably has to do with analog voicing of the opa134/2134 into THAT line buffers. It’s warm and punchy without being full on saturated like Apogee. Gear those ti/bb opamps tends to be less clear in the top end than than the flatter NE5532/5534 using gear but of course everything is a trade off and opamp rolling is retarded and the opamps being used are no mark of quality in and of themselves.

Moving to my MOTU sabre interface was a big upgrade for detail and extension in the upper and lower end from the source, it sounds more open there, but it’s less “solid” sounding while still being slightly warm. It doesn’t have the monstrous dynamics of dangerous of course but isn’t overdamped like RME. Dangerous has a better phantom center but I would prefer an even more solid one than that given my slightly imbalanced hearing. Too bad Apogee isn’t cool on windows and the Apogee treble is soft, which probably leads to that compacted sound stage.

 

I thought I remember reading here or maybe elsewhere that someone swapped out the SMPS with a LPS in the Convert-2, and brought it to some local meet. What would be the benefits of doing this? (And no I ain't modding this nor care to tweak shit, but I am curious) Better power supplies = better bass quality? Owners of the Dangerous Source did report audible gains replacing the external SMPS.

Audiophiles have this weird Dr. Frankenstein complex.

 

You guys weren't kidding when saying the outputs are hot. I've had the C2 for a few days now, using it mostly for speaker listening in an all balanced chain: USB -> C2 -> Singlepower Supra -> McCormack DNA2 -> Dynaudio Focus 260s

Packs quite a punch and definitely sounds best paired with tube preamp/DNA2's warmer top end. It's a very hifi sound which was both expected but still surprising for a pro DAC. I wont repeat what's already been said, the reviews here are mostly spot on. The synergy in my chain is definitely there as the rest of my gear is definitely on the warmer end of things, and the addition of the C2 really brought slam/a level of involvement I was looking for.

Needless to say I am now very happy with my 2 channel setup and am done pursuing bigger and better things!

Thank you to all who participated in giving impressions in this thread as they have been invaluable to me.

 

Dude you ain't kidding.

Didn't think I was going to pull out the CD players on Christmas but before I send off the Convert-2, I wanted to see how my 27lb tank failing Onkyo DV-SP1000 compared to its XMOS USB and also the Onkyo C-7030 I bought a few years ago to compare the built-in DACs of these players.

First thing though: the Onkyo C-7030 is pure AIDS. I have this SE connected to my Valhalla 2 and HD650. It's very brittle sounding, hazy and treble is muted. This is the worst bass I've ever heard from these headphones and snares sound like they are being tapped on coffee cans. Vocals are chopped to shit. This sounds like a worse sounding Modi 3. Optical out is crap as well. Do NOT buy this piece of garbage. Unless you desire the most digital noise to playback Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music.

Now shifting over to the DV-SP1000, an ancient universal player that can play SACDs, THX-Ultra BS, $2k, yadda yadda. Picked this up from a Craiglist ad 7 years ago, but sadly it's having trouble reading CDs. The laser mechanism is probably on its last legs. I don't know what I did with the replacement drive I bought on eBay. I got lazy and just stuck with USB for music playback and put the player back in storage.

Anyway, this thing f'ing destroys the C-7030. Vocals are much more liquid, able to render smoother changes in pitch volume with just a touch of static in the higher notes. The C-7030 vocals are extremely flat and one note. And the entire audio frequency range sounds like you are putting it into a cheese grater. With the other player it's much much harder to detect digital noise. And with optical out to the Convert-2 (yes I know worse than coaxial SPDIF when it comes to jitter), it's even better than the XMOS USB at removing a thin layer of haze. The Convert-2 is already dynamic as hell, but there just the tiniest bit more texture revealed in instruments. I'm surprised. One of the flaws I found with the Convert-2 is there is a lack of reverb around certain instruments/vocals that I know should be there. It's played back too cleanly. This is more noticeable with my speakers, as there is this deep black canvas and with the lack of the tiniest details, there is just a bit too much separation between instruments in a recording. It's like the musicians stand out on their own but separated to the degree where there's a lack of cohesion. I like how with the Gungnir there is this lower level of information that is brought up that "completes" more of the sonic picture.

The Convert-2 is neither nuanced Nor subtle. Once you get passed the sensation of massive hard hitting punchy dynamics, extremely black background, lack of digitus, its flaws as a DAC start to emerge. There's missing layers that prevent me from total immersion in the music. And how it does layering is two dimensional. This is obviously much more noticeable with headphones. Convert-2 really is the bully at the schoolyard without a brain. Where the Gungnir Multibit is more sensei-like. If all I had were speakers, I'd keep the Convert-2 cause it's a shit ton of fun and you can rock out. But even with the HD650s, which is already smooth and relaxed, it becomes a very fatiguing experience fast. I prefer a softer presentation with headphones, something I can listen to for hours. I can't ditch headphones totally yet due to my living situation.

Got off on a tangent...back to the CD players. But yeah with this old ass Onkyo CD player, even from the optical out to Convert-2, is even more explosive and more natural sounding than over XMOS USB. I dunno if this spinner is even considered "hi-fi" but it shits all over my cheaper Onkyo. However I don't think its completely worth chasing down a super expensive CD player. XMOS USB is still plenty competent. The built-in DAC definitely ain't as good as the Convert-2, but it's miles better than what's in the C-730.

Convert-2 and this CD Player have me wondering what vinyl sounds like, but I ain't getting into that rabbit hole. I'm way too f'ing neurotic as it is.

What a way to spend Christmas eh?

EDIT: One of my first posts here on SBAF was about that crap Onkyo. Now it makes sense having a few different boxes available for comparision.
https://www.superbestaudiofriends.o...purpose-advice-thread.19/page-382#post-248184

 

@purr1n @RobS only pci type solutions (rme and lynx cards, Focusrite Rednet pci e cards, thunderbolt with GOOD DRIVERs) and FGPA USB have not really changed the sound for me compared to properly clocked AES/spdif and even Adat with a new cable. For USB, only RME is rock solid across multiple OSes. RME usb is better than most brands’ PCI-E and thunderbolt. They as a corporation seem know more about the audio stack of various oses than Microsoft and Apple seem to do themselves given how their own audio drivers suck. MOTU has good usb sound on windows but is only super fast and super stable on OSX. Thunderbolt is hit or miss even on Macs. Focusrite is very hit or miss. Apogee boxes usually work well and the Presonus Quantum works well on both Windows and OSX despite third party drivers but the sound quality is dogshit and worse than cheap Focusrite Scarletts.

The standard Thesyscon xmos asio drivers for windows and stock core audio drivers on Mac OS implementation pretty much sucks and leads to gimped products with inferior sound on Macs and unstable operation in Windows. Some vendors sometimes use different third party vendors for drivers like Focusrite, SPL, and the Japanese manufacturers that gets better sound but still has hit or miss stability. It’s so disappointing that it’s going to be 2020, there are dozens of interface manufacturers, and their products are all gimped compared to the same few brands who have been writing drivers and updating from a decade ago with RME well ahead of the others in addressing issues.

 

I'm on Windows 10 and the XMOS UAC2 driver I downloaded from the Dangerous website has mostly worked without a hitch in foobar2000 and other streaming services, but I've had issues where it'll play the next song from an album or playlist, skip to the middle of a song and then back to the intro. Or it skips a few seconds in the intro or drops the audio for a second before resuming playback. Don't know about DAWs, I don't record nor produce. I am using XMOS ASIO in Qobuz, and whatever the "Exclusive" mode setting is in Tidal. WASAPI for foobar2000. Qobuz is a shitty application though, you can skip around in a track but it doesn't track what position you leave it to.

Schiit Eitr is a little more stable in regards to streaming, but its assier sounding than the XMOS in the Convert-2. I'm not a fan of that USB box. I'm glad Schiit is doing their own proprietary USB implementation though. It's probably why Moffat prefers it over SPDIF now cause he should be able to control the clocks. In theory I would think it would provide better jitter performance even with the VXCOs they have in the Gungnir and Yggdrasil.

And that's another thing I don't get about the Gungnir and Yggdrasil DACs. There is no master slave internal clock on these DACs, so SPDIF sources aren't slaving to them. Maybe with Unison that's no longer the case?

I was thinking of picking up a Pi2AES box but you need Raspberry Pi and whatever else. And I don't like having a bunch of gizmos to defuckify digital signals. The thing that stops any kind of nervosa is sheer laziness. If Schiit could give me an AIO with Ragnarok with tubes and Yggdrasil built in, I'd buy it and get rid of all this other crap. I still have too much crap lying around.

I'm still surprised the extra bite, air and resolution added from this archaic Onkyo compared to the XMOS USB. The Convert-2 lacks some of that air with USB, but the CD player does help to mitigate that. Too bad my player is going to be dead soon.

But yeah I f'ing hate drivers in general though. I'm having a hell of a headache trying to get some of these video drivers to work with black frame insertion when using RetroArch to render SNES games with that CRT look. Stop-gap until I get another Trinitron tube in my possession again haha.

 

This is why I ended up getting a Lynx PCIe card. AES out to the Convert-2 sounds great, though I didn't have any particular issue with the USB either. There is a small gain in airiness and resolution using the Lynx output vs USB that makes it worthwhile, and things seem more stable when the Convert-2 is set to run the show with the word clock.

 

Yeah and that small gain ain't like you have to squint to notice it. It's a clear audible difference. For how much the Convert-2 costs, might as well get that Lynx card or a decent CD player to squeeze out the most performance. I downgraded to the Gungnir so I don't mind my shit being gimped haha.

 

@elmoe, that's my experience as well. I dragged my feet getting my AES 16e connected to the Convert. But when I did today, I instantly noted the increased air up top and resolution. With this in place, there is no need to go chasing after other DACs of different architectures (but I did but that's for the SBAF DAC II thread )

 

Yep the only thing that bugs me with the Convert-2 is the lack of outputs, only 1 balanced output is one less than I would like to have, it'd be great to have an unbalanced RCA output also but that's what preamps are for I guess

 

You still going to hang onto your Gungnir? I wanted to downgrade to a point where I could live with. Modi 3 doesn't cut the mustard and Fulla 2 is lol. Sure in the context of $99 they are alright I suppose but it's hard going back to garbage after getting ears on the Convert-2. I'm saving up money for a pair of Barefoot monitors to upgrade my JBLs so I might go back to the Convert-2 one day.

I would like to move on from Schiit gear. While I do like the Mjolnir 2 a lot, and its the first amp that I finally could hear the potential for the HD650 to scale, its definitely capping what the Convert-2 can do. Staging with Convert-2 aint that great but it's worse with Mjolnir 2 as its more flat and too upfront. With the tubes I have in the Mjolnir 2, the sharp lines are a bit smeared over. Both exhibit a fuckton of slam and its too fatiguing with headphones. Just not a good pairing for me. Oh well.

Can't put a price on enjoyment but I think the Convert-2 is still overpriced. Yeah dealer markups and all that but what you get for $2400 just aint worth it IMO. I find the depressed center image, where center vocals are pushed further back in the mix, to be somewhat of a dealbreaker.

 

@RobS, I wish someone would buy my Gungnir (it's 220V). It's lying idle for a while now. It did its job but that stopped when I bought the Yggdrasil.

The simplicity of connections (plain USB) with the Convert 2 was what attracted me to it first (I had used the Yggdrasil A1 for 3-4 years prior and bought the AES 16e to get the best sound out of it). And until today, USB was the only digital input I used. I saw the earlier posts on the Lynx cards. These and some advice from @Psalmanazar (my guide on anything Dangerous Music) motivated me to plug in the AES 16e. The cost of the Convert 2 was/is a non-issue compared to the Yggdrasil. In addition, the Convert has features that a guy like me will never use. But more important, the Convert gives me the detail, resolution and slam that I crave in my music. I listen to hard rock only and I am not fatigued at all after hours of listening to the likes of Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath etc. To top it all, I use the Utopia so my listening preferences are probably the polar opposite of yours.

 

Damn Yggdrasil that bad compared to the Convert-2?

Rock music with Convert-2 and speakers is killer. Headphones I'm a loud listener to the cusp of hearing loss. What headphone amp you got hooked up to the Convert?

 

I am not saying the Yggdrasil is bad. I prefer the presentation of the Convert. As far as amps go, on the SS end, I use the Phonitor 2, the BW1 and the Sapphire. On the tube side of things, I have Mogwai SE, the SW 51+, BH Crack (with Speedball) and a 2A3 made for me locally. Apart from the Phonitor 2 (which I can directly plug into), I use a Jensen Isomax 1:1 transformer (PO 2XR) for the other amps.

 

I wonder if this fatigue is more of a Schiit amp problem than the DAC. How do you like that Phonitor with Convert-2 and HD600/650? I haven't found a solid state amp I've liked with either headphone.

 

Phonitor 2 would be quite the opposite of the Mjolnir 2 (from your description of it). To me its relaxed yet presenting all detail and resolution galore. I really like the HD 600 with the Phonitor. The 600 is my favorite Senn HP.

 

Yeah Dangerous is awesome for metal and hard rock. Tons of punch and detail and the tamed air prevents many recordings from becoming a blizzard of noise. The SPL headamps are very good. I’m not sure they’re worth their USA price but they’re hard to beat. Even the jack on the Crimson is good.

The MJ2 I only liked tube rolled fed by the Holo Spring. Otherwise, it’s too sharp. Even there, the presentation was overly wide. There wasn’t a rock solid stereo center.

 

Yeah I hear you about the top end, too much grit with stock tubes. It seems like a Schiit characteristic for just a bit too much brightness, grit in the treble and in your face staging. Looks like Ragnarok 2 pushed back the staging enough to where people wondered if it was a Schiit amp lol. But hey the MJ2 was the amp to kick the HE-6 to the curb...

The Gungnir Multibit A1 and WE tubes I got were to tackle some of these MJ2 issues.