R2R DAC paired with vintage Marantz ...too warm, or a good match?

[Fisten]

Hoping some of you can share some insight before I make a purchase:

I have a Marantz 2325 driving a pair of 4 ohm AR11 speakers, and currently have a sub $200 delta sigma DAC connected for streaming and CD. The turntable connects directly to the receiver. All three inputs sound great.

But...

I was thinking about switching out the DAC for the FIIO F11 R2R. Never heard an R2R DAC before, and the common opinion is that it's a more analog/warm sound.

I'm a little conflicted: Would the R2R Dac, more closely match/complement the tone of my old 70's analog gear for the digital inputs, or would a warm dac combined with a warm receiver make things too muddy? Am I better off with a more crisp sound given the Marantz's typically warm characteristics?

 

[HB3]

Only your ears can figure that one out. Buy from somewhere that accepts returns and try it out. I have a K11 R2R and it does have a soft and warm presentation that I like a lot.

 

[Vlad Soare]

All things being equal, an R2R DAC has more distorsion than a delta sigma one. Whether you find that distorsion likeable or not, is up to you to decide.

Ideally, you don't want the DAC to have any sound of its own, be it warm or not. You want the DAC to do nothing more than just convert the stream of zeroes and ones into a waveform that's as perfectly identical as possible to the original one, with absolutely nothing added or subtracted. Any kind of added "warmth", or "analog character", or whatever you want to call it, is either distortion, or non-linear frequency response, or both.

Take a look at these measurements. What I'm seeing there looks like a complete disaster to me. Personally, I wouldn't touch a DAC that measured like this with a ten-foot pole.

 

[Fisten]

All things being equal, an R2R DAC has more distorsion than a delta sigma one. Whether you find that distorsion likeable or not, is up to you to decide.

Ideally, you don't want the DAC to have any sound of its own, be it warm or not. You want the DAC to do nothing more than just convert the stream of zeroes and ones into a waveform that's as perfectly identical as possible to the original one, with absolutely nothing added or subtracted. Any kind of added "warmth", or "analog character", or whatever you want to call it, is either distortion, or non-linear frequency response, or both.

Take a look at these measurements. What I'm seeing there looks like a complete disaster to me. Personally, I wouldn't touch a DAC that measured like this with a ten-foot pole.

Thanks both for the input. HB3, I've heard generally positive reviews/comments re: the K11 R2R, but they are usually paired with a modern very neutral amp/reciever, or headphones.

Vlad, I'm not going to pretend I understand the graphs, though. Could you tell me where the most impactful measurements are/what to look for? There is a LOT of data there.

How does the topping-dx3pro-ldac look? I could really use the two coax inputs. One for my streamer, one for the CD player.

 

[Vlad Soare]

Vlad, I'm not going to pretend I understand the graphs, though. Could you tell me where the most impactful measurements are/what to look for? There is a LOT of data there.

Here's a good, comprehensive article on this subject, that explains how to read all these graphs.
It's a long story, and I couldn't even dream of tellling it better than Amir does in that article, so I won't try to. But just to give you an idea, compare the review of the FIIO above with this one of a delta-sigma DAC that performs admirably well.
The difference is stunning in all aspects. The amount of distorsion beggars belief. The linearity is anything but. The SINAD (signal to noise and distortion ratio) is a laughable 72 dB, which is much less than what even a standard audio CD is capable of, let alone higher resolution formats. What's the point having a recording medium capable of a dynamic range of 96 dB, when you use a DAC that cannot resolve more than 72? And so on...
By contrast, said delta-sigma DAC sports a very respectable SINAD of 120 dB, its distorsion is below -130 dB, and the linearity test graph is arrow-straight. It's pretty much textbook stuff.

Making an R2R DAC that performs well is extremely difficult and expensive. Therefore, most of them don't perform well.
However, those distortions and non-linearities can sound pleasing, which is why many people prefer them. R2R DACs may not be technically accurate, but they can sound good, because 'good' is in the ear of the beholder.

 

[Vlad Soare]

How does the topping-dx3pro-ldac look?

Much better:

Topping DX3 Pro+ Review (DAC & Headphone Amp)

This is a review and detailed measurements of the Topping DX3 Pro+ DAC and headphone amplifier. It is a replacement for one of my most favorite combo products, the DX3 Pro. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $199. The DX3 Pro+ maintains the gorgeous and high contrast orange LEDs...

www.audiosciencereview.com

It looks excellent. Maybe just a tad below the E50 I linked above, but still perfectly good for all practical purposes. Audibly, they would most likely be indistinguishable from each other.

 

[Fisten]

Much better:

Topping DX3 Pro+ Review (DAC & Headphone Amp)

This is a review and detailed measurements of the Topping DX3 Pro+ DAC and headphone amplifier. It is a replacement for one of my most favorite combo products, the DX3 Pro. It was sent to me by the company and costs US $199. The DX3 Pro+ maintains the gorgeous and high contrast orange LEDs...

www.audiosciencereview.com

It looks excellent. Maybe just a tad below the E50 I linked above, but still perfectly good for all practical purposes. Audibly, they would most likely be indistinguishable from each other.

Thanks for all this. Helping me figure out what I want vs what I need vs what I have already!

The search for something better started out with my current setup, which is a WIIM Ultra DAC, which scores pretty well, according to AMIRM;s review/scoring, and TBH does sound great. The issue I have is that it doesn't have a coax-in, so I can only play CD's via TOSLINK. This is why I was thinking about switching it out for something that had more useful inputs.

What the Ultra DAC does have (besides the TOSLINK-IN), is an HDMI ARC and a USB in port. My CD transport, a bluray player, has HDMI, coax, and TOSLINK out.

Do you know if there is a way to convert any of the blueray's higher fidelity outputs to anything the Ultra can use, or am I stuck using optical?

 

[Isotonic]

All things being equal, an R2R DAC has more distorsion than a delta sigma one. Whether you find that distorsion likeable or not, is up to you to decide.

Ideally, you don't want the DAC to have any sound of its own, be it warm or not. You want the DAC to do nothing more than just convert the stream of zeroes and ones into a waveform that's as perfectly identical as possible to the original one, with absolutely nothing added or subtracted. Any kind of added "warmth", or "analog character", or whatever you want to call it, is either distortion, or non-linear frequency response, or both.

Take a look at these measurements. What I'm seeing there looks like a complete disaster to me. Personally, I wouldn't touch a DAC that measured like this with a ten-foot pole.

That's not everyone's ideal.

Some people want gear that sounds good. Some people want gear that lends insight into the performance. Even studio engineers are known for picking gear that helps them find an esthetic ideal, not a measurement ideal. Yes the gear must be competent, but tone color is fundamental. And matching tone color to artistic strength is what drives choice.

For example, legendary engineer, Chet Himes, was famous for using some of the trashiest gear around. He loved MXR 1/3 octave equalizers. No one understood why, but when he was done layering them in, the result was beautiful. Chet Himes recorded Christopher Cross's Grammy winning debut. A gorgeous High Fidelity recording. I used to know the house engineer who managed the equipment at a studio he frequented. No one understood why or how he came up with his sounds, he was frequently drunk and he made big messes with the electronics. But he was the star of that scene, because he made beautiful, world class recordings.

Even classical recording, which has become very sophisticated, has become an illusion show. The recordings are fantastic. Best ever. But they are an amalgam of performances.

An exception to this might be a label like Waterlily productions who were strictly live to two track. Though they had some success, their records always came across as cold to me. And they were always an obscure label.

Earthworks used to make some of the best measurement microphones in the world. But almost nobody used them to record a vocal. They were used as needed to serve specialty needs, or for contrast to tonal shading. The gold standard for recording vocals has always been the Nuemann U-47. A tube microphone known for an uneven frequency response and distortion. But the sound is golden!

Music is Art FIRST. Science is to serve the art, not govern it.

 

[Vlad Soare]

That's not everyone's ideal.

Some people want gear that sounds good. Some people want gear that lends insight into the performance. Even studio engineers are known for picking gear that helps them find an esthetic ideal, not a measurement ideal. Yes the gear must be competent, but tone color is fundamental. And matching tone color to artistic strength is what drives choice.

Like I said, 'good' is in the ear of the beholder. If you like the sound of a distorting, non-linear DAC that makes a mess of it, good for you. There's nothing wrong with that. But you need to know that that 'good' sound you're hearing is not what was recorded on the CD, and is not what the recording engineer meant it to be. If you're aware of this but don't mind it, that's perfectly fine.

Of course, nothing in the audio chain is perfect. The speakers will always add lots of distortion and non-linearities of their own anyway, not to mention the effects of the room you're listening in. We will never reach perfect transparency. We'll never hear exactly what the sound engineer was hearing. But that's no reason not to strive for it, at least as far as it's technically possible. Accepting imperfections we can do nothing about is one thing. Accepting defects that could easily be avoided is quite another.

Music is Art FIRST. Science is to serve the art, not govern it.

Yes, it is. And that's exactly what I want to hear. I want to hear the art of the musicians, not the electronic artefacts of a badly engineered piece of gear.
Science serves the art best by being as faithful to it as possible. If science adds distortions, then it's not serving the art, but quite the contrary, it's making it a major disservice.

 

[Middle Earth]

I really like audible harmonic distortion
But often Amir and his adherents get the vapors about inaudible distortion which is bemusing
Me, I don’t care about what other people like or do
Want clean, audition one of the three Topping 1 Bit DACs
I had the D90 1-Bit Discrete and I liked it a lot running though SET tube amplifiers

 

[Vlad Soare]

But often Amir and his adherents get the vapors about inaudible distortion which is bemusing

That's true, though in fairness there is logic in that.

Firstly, when the D/A conversion is a solved issue, and most devices are able to do it transparently, how do you differentiate between them? Should you just give up, declare that all of them are good enough from now on, and just pick whichever is cheapest and looks best on your shelf? Or should you look deeper and try to distinguish really great engineering from stuff where the engineer said, 'that will do' and went home earlier? Amir chooses the latter approach, and personally I think it's a fair one. OK, I'll give you that a -10dB improvement will be inaudible if you were at -120dB to begin with, but you still cannot help appreciating an engineering team that has gone the extra mile to squeeze an extra drop of performance. Is that extra drop of performance useless? Perhaps it is. But it's still nice to know it's there. I don't need 450 HP in my daily driver, but boy do I love having it and wouldn't trade it for anything in the world (except for more).

Secondly, inaudible out-of-band distortion can generate its own distortion in-band, which can be audible. This is usually the case with filterless, non-oversampling DACs, a class most R2R DACs belong to. Or with otherwise competent DACs but which offer a choice of user-selectable filters, one of which is none at all.
Audible distortion can sound pleasing, though. I won't contest that.

 

[Middle Earth]

That's true, though in fairness there is logic in that.

Firstly,, when the D/A conversion is a solved issue, and most devices are able to do it transparently, how do you differentiate between them? Should you just give up, declare that all of them are good enough from now on, and just pick whichever is cheapest and looks best on your shelf? Or should you look deeper and try to distinguish really great engineering from stuff where the engineer said, 'that will do' and went home earlier? Amir chooses the latter approach, and personally I think it's a fair one. OK, I'll give you that a -10dB improvement will be inaudible if you were at -120dB to begin with, but you still cannot help appreciating an engineering team that has gone the extra mile to squeeze an extra drop of performance. Is that extra drop of performance useless? Perhaps it is. But it's still nice to know it's there. I don't need 450 HP in my daily driver, but boy do I love having it and wouldn't trade it for anything in the world (except for more).

Secondly, inaudible out-of-band distortion can generate its own distortion in-band, which can be audible. This is usually the case with filterless, non-oversampling DACs, a class most R2R DACs belong to. Or with otherwise competent DACs but which offer a choice of user-selectable filters, one of which is none at all.
Audible distortion can sound pleasing, though. I won't contest that.

I am a member of ASR and find it to have some utility and some bemusement
I would love to own a MPD-8 Playback Designs Digital Analog Converter and a
MPT-8 Playback Designs Transport Streamer but that would be beyond my financial tier
I will respectfully disagree that digital is “solved” and I do believe there are levels and don’t rule out that even a fuse, which seems idiotic to me, could make a positive difference to some people even if it is psycho-acoustic which is a thing
I would agree the notion that digital is solved in that the majority of people, myself included, are contented with fairly inexpensive DACs but I also believe there is enjoyment to be had between a Playback Designs DAC and an Apple dongle.
I purposefully add second order harmonic distortion with tube amplification but tubes can play pristine precise sound you just have to pay for it.
I suppose on a Venn diagram there is a lot of overlap between us, but I skew towards the zone of the subjectivists and I am assuming you would skew towards the objectivists.
There are cats and dogs in the subjectivists versus objectivists and some who are more sanguine and seeing that both sides have merit
In the end I don’t care how people spend the time and treasure
P.S. I have spent thousands of hours sitting in bumper to bumper traffic in a high horsepower car in So Cal and the irony was not lost on me

 

[playittwice]

I use a R2R DAC with several tube amps, none are “too warm” sounding.
I also use K-Horn speakers, so it’s beautiful synergy for me.

I should add, I have had two other DAC’s, not R2R’s, and I would not switch back.
So to answer the OP, I would say a R2R won’t be “too warm” with a SS amp, but of course you have to decide for yourself, as was mentioned above. Too many variables.

 

[Middle Earth]

I use a R2R DAC with several tube amps, none are “too warm” sounding.
I also use K-Horn speakers, so it’s beautiful synergy for me.

I should add, I have had two other DAC’s, not R2R’s, and I would not switch back.
So to answer the OP, I would say a R2R won’t be “too warm” with a SS amp, but of course you have to decide for yourself, as was mentioned above. Too many variables.

Respect to the K-Horns
I may never get to own them but I would love to demo them for a month or few
La Scala 5 is more likely to be in my future

 

[playittwice]

My son bought a new pair a year ago. They sound very nice indeed. He uses a hi-end SS 11.1 receiver for HT, and a Scott 222b for two channel, the sub is incorporated into two channel as well.
Pretty cool.

I think you will be happy with them.

Here’s his setup. The round black thing in the upper right corner, the size of a water heater, is the sub.

 

[Middle Earth]

My son bought a new pair a year ago. They sound very nice indeed. He uses a hi-end SS 11.1 receiver for HT, and a Scott 222b for two channel, the sub is incorporated into two channel as well.
Pretty cool.

I think you will be happy with them.

Here’s his setup. The round black thing in the upper right corner, the size of a water heater, is the sub.
View attachment 3628347

Such a beautiful space
You son is blessed

 

[Isotonic]

I use a R2R DAC with several tube amps, none are “too warm” sounding.
I also use K-Horn speakers, so it’s beautiful synergy for me.

I should add, I have had two other DAC’s, not R2R’s, and I would not switch back.
So to answer the OP, I would say a R2R won’t be “too warm” with a SS amp, but of course you have to decide for yourself, as was mentioned above. Too many variables.

I have yet to own an R2R DAC, but there is a lot of literature out there about them. And there are a lot of enthusiastic users. Though some models have been described as warm, not all of them are described that way. For example, the original Denafrips Venus had a reputation for the opposite. Many thought it was too clean, with an upward tilt.

I think you can spend very little and still get a good sounding DAC, but I have also spent about $1500 and gotten better. I am very curious about what might be out there beyond.

I wouldn't ever let anyone tell me that all DACs sound the same. And that the development of DACs is solved. It's simply not true. I have heard the differences. And if their response is always, that your hearing is a figment...How do they know that? It's a very weak argument.

That's the fun of this hobby. Listening and learning. There was a time, back in the 80s, 90s or so when a lot of engineers and techs were saying that all tubes sounded the same. They said the same thing about solid state amps. They have long been proven wrong.

On the other hand, I have yet to discern a game changing difference between most cables. Or if I did, it was minor and nothing I would spend thousands for.

I have heard $1/4 million systems in a truly bad room. Nothing could fix the nodes and standing waves. Not even $10,000 of Shakti Sticks. But I have heard similar systems sound so good, that it changed my perception of what was possible.

Hearing itself is a skill. Noticing nuance in timber, dynamics and also developing your sense if the acoustic frequency spectrum. Hearing what a room sounds like before the stereo us turned on.

All of this learning. That is the fun for me.

 

[playittwice]

I also feel, the more revealing your speakers are, the more little nuances and imperfections you detect, in my experience anyway.

 

[Isotonic]

I also feel, the more revealing your speakers are, the more little nuances and imperfections you detect, in my experience anyway.

True. For me, a lot was revealed when I had access to the high end. That doesn't mean my Pioneer SX 950 is bad. I still enjoy it. I still pursue vintage. But the high end stuff I own and have heard reveals more. It offers a depth of nuance that is rarely available otherwise. Just like riding a luxury vehicle. It doesn't make a Camry bad. In Camrys are excellent. But still, a Camry is not a luxury vehicle. It doesn't feel like one, or drive like one.

 

[playittwice]

@Fisten. did you snag a DAC chet?