Muffled sound while using DAC

[dgwestfall75]

Hi folks, just a quick question about my DAC setup. I have the DAC running to my Yamaha CR2020 and to a set of Polk M7s and using an Apple Airport Express to received the stream from my phone. The Airport Express is connected via optical cable to the DAC and the DAC is connected via RCA cables to the phono input on the receiver. All of a sudden, everything sounds muffled...low mids and no highs. I ran the system to a newer Yamaha receiver...same result. Also ran through another set of speakers and no change. So I thought maybe the DAC was failing (just using a cheap Insigna DAC from Best Buy) so I replaced it as well as the RCA cables with no change. The only things I have not changed is the airport express and the optical cord. Everything sounded amazing (as amazing as it could sound via this setup) for over a year and now in the last week it's terrible. Any ideas?

 

[ivandezande]

You narrowed it down to the Airport Express being the issue. There you go.

The newest model ran from 2012-18, time to give it up.

 

[dgwestfall75]

Any suggestion as to what to use in its place? I don't use the system often so I don't need anything terribly expensive.

 

[gvl]

I'm not convinced it's the AE's fault, it's the kind of device that tends to work or not, but not sound in any particular way. Any chance you have some sort of EQ or lower quality playback level accidentally enabled on the phone?

 

[dgwestfall75]

Yea, I kind of thought the Airport Express either works or doesn’t too but I’ve tried with two different phones and get the same result. I don’t see any changes on sound quality from the phone and have the equalizer turned off. What about the optical cable between the airport and the DAC? I thought those either work or don’t as well and didn’t change it.

 

[dgwestfall75]

Just weird because I haven’t changed anything and everything sounded great until it didn’t.

 

[grinx76]

why are you running into your phono stage?

that has different input requirements than CD/Auc/Tuner/etc.

 

[dgwestfall75]

why are you running into your phono stage?

that has different input requirements than CD/Auc/Tuner/etc.

Yep, that was the problem. I didn’t realize the input requirements are different. I usually use CD or AUX but guess I got in a hurry. Thanks everyone!

 

[gvl]

why are you running into your phono stage?

that has different input requirements than CD/Auc/Tuner/etc.

Oh, didn't notice that. If it's indeed a true phono stage input it would sound muffled because if RIIA EQ, but it would likely distort because of high input sensitivity.