Enamored by the Burr-Brown PCM1796 DAC chip

I got an Onkyo DV-SP506 DVD-based universal player (in silver, no less)....featuring three Burr-Brown PCM1796 DACs. And retailers were dumping these player for $250.00 brand-new when Blu-ray player came out.

 

I ended up getting a TEAC UD-301 last year and I'm still very satisfied with the sound. It's got a PCM1795 chip in it. Even after hearing a bunch of different DACs at various audio stores, the UD-301 keeps me happy for hours and hours without fatigue. It isn't a poorly-measuring distortion-filled sludgefest either like a lot of "warm" DACs tend to be.

 

Some of the older chips are really quite good. Modern chips prioritize size and power consumption and sound quality is not necessarily improved. There are some modern, ultra premium digital devices that utilize some old chips that command big dollars. My Naim NDS 555 music server utilizes Burr Brown 1704 chips that are well past 20 years old.

 

Yea, I think Naim bought a huge stock of PCM 1704 chips before TI shut down production. I've been using a PCM 1704 based DAC for the last 20+ years, very nice sounding, though of course it takes a lot more than just a good sounding D/A convertor to make a good sounding DAC.

 

Yeah, you and me both on the 1704's --- I typed a response to this thread yesterday offering the 1704 but didn't post it.

I have 4 x PCM1704 in my Denon DCD-S10iii/L and it still is tough to beat for me.

That particular era where Denon was equipping many Japan market only players with the 1702 / 1704 was a good time for CD only players back then.... a lot of those players still have a solid resale market too. I'm not selling mine.

 

For anyone that hasn't seen this (many have) but if you've ever wondered what DAC your particular player employs:


CD-Player-DAC-Transport List

Cryptic format, a pain to navigate, but quite complete and accurate I think.

 

Yep, I think the production shutdown (and the huge rise in prices before that) of the PCM 1704 is a big part of what spurred the proliferation of discrete R-2R DACs we see now.

 

And I just learned that, thanks! I didn't realize that.

 

I've heard a lot of favorable things about the 1704. The 1795/6 both sound so good it's hard for me to imagine something better. Is it worth shelling out big bucks for a 1704-based DAC?

 

Count me in on the 1704 wagon. Love the implementation of 4x 1704-UK chips in my Lite Audio DAC 83. Has a super output stage too and good power supply, which I think helps a lot.

 

My Adcom GDA-700 has a pair of 1702's. The PCM63 was a great sounding chip too.

 

My MHDT Lab Pagoda also uses a pair of 1704's. Wonderful sound quality.

 

Rather, it is that audiophile companies today are "hobbyists" in comparison to the lightyears-beyond of DAC IC makers with dedicated flammable fabs, and must subsist in a land where you can talk enthusiasts into the mystique of an R2R that can't beat an iPhone, that at least can be pick-n-placed with 1000 $0.01 Chinese resistors.

14-year old 16-bit DAC is a megalopolis



Zoomed, still can't reveal true details of the VLSI.


Let's contemplate 44 years ago, Burr-Brown DAC80, which was made of nearly a dozen "discrete" semiconductor dies in an IC package. Its 12-bit DAC resistor network - laser trimmed:


Its laser trimmed voltage divider for adding its three 0.01% tolerance current switches:


(die pics Google Translate )

 

Burr Brown PCM63P was probably the best DAC chip ever produced but sadly went out of production years ago. Plus they were rather expensive. When the engineer at Schitt was asked in an interview what the best DAC chip ever made was, he stated it was the PCM63P.
Originally it was designed for more interesting duty's like steering missiles in flight. The military didn't care much about the cost. They just wanted the best digital (Computer calculated error correction) to analog (analog input servo motors for flap control) chips they could buy.
They just happen to sound so good that some makers used them in their audio products.

BillWojo

 

I do wonder how much the high tech aspect of digital to analogue conversion really matters. Audio Note makes dacs that do not oversample and do not employ a brick wall filter. As one goes up their lineup of models, the digital conversion circuit doesn’t change, it is the analogue amplification that gets better. To me, they make some of the most natural sounding dacs.

 

I agree...

I think the "differences" are more along the lines of how the DAC chip is implemented, than anything to do with the chip itself. What differences you hear, if any, are mostly due to the supporting hardware, not the chip.

 

Soooo, you have a tight budget for a TT, but are willing to spend $1,500 on a DAC? Blasphemous traitor!!!

 

For some time, I've been salivating at a couple of expensive (by my standards) DACs, namely the Border Patrol NOS one, and the Benchmark DAC3 B, both under $2K. Funny thing is - I can afford them, but, for the life of me, I cannot hear a single fault with my Cambridge DAC Magic+, a $500 unit when new. Furthermore, to be honest, I cannot even hear any fault with the Schiit Modi Uber, for which I paid... $69 on Amazon. So, I simply can't justify spending so much on these DACs, since I don't know what problem it would be solving.

Likewise, after lusting for a Naim CD5si, a $1700 CDP, I've decided against it, as I see almost no issues with the Onkyo C-7030 it would be replacing. I'm sure it's a little better, but, for the price of one Naim I could have bought literally ten Onkyos - is it ten times better? Somehow I doubt it.

The point I'm trying to make, the DAC technology has progressed and matured so much and so far, that I don't believe there are any "bad" DACs out there. The more expensive DACs simply have more bells and whistles that, as pointed out above, we mostly can't even hear (i.e. only very few of us can).

 

Oh please. I guarantee my Gold Note DS-10 would change your opinion on this!

 

The planned turntable budget also includes a planned about $1000 phono and a suitable cartridge. More expensive it total than the DAC.

That hypothetical DAC I was joking about buying was probably a PS Audio DirectStream. The DirectStream was getting hammered on a measurement oriented site because it didn't measure good enough for them. I figured that negative attention may have lowered the resale value to around $1500 since you can buy DACs for a couple hundred that measured better. I consider the DirectStream to be a good DAC.

 

I worked for Sandia National Labs for many years in the semiconductor area. We made a lot of different chips for use by the military including for the nuclear warhead refurbishing projects. Never thought about sticking one in a DAC I believe the AMD chip used in the Schiit Modi multibit was designed for use in medical equipment.

 

DAC chips designed for guided missiles ending up in audio gear is just part of the rich tradition of the military industrial complex's contribution to HiFi. JAN VT-231 tubes, the Bendix ICBM rectifier, etc.

 

It is hard to separate whether the chips have gotten better from whether the implementation has improved.

Certainly measured performance of many of today's DACs is well ahead of what even very good CD players etc. could do 20 years ago. I am agnostic about whether that is down to the chip. The very best manufacturers do not buy in the core silicon but design in-house.

The Chord DAVE is a technical marvel that they have very effectively distilled down into their lower priced products.

My Chord 2Qute is a significant step up on my Arcam CD93T, despite fairly rough-and-ready SMPS on the former.

I'd get the DAVE or a dCS if I had the money. One day...

 

I have been completely satisfied with my now aged Peachtree iNova, that retailed for $1,800 back when (I bought it used).

The main central point of control, is provided by the Peachtree iNova. It is used as a source selector, ESS Saber DAC and Class-A SS preamp. All power amps are outboard.



(The headphones are Hi-FI Man HE-400 planer open back headphones.)

The main reason (and only reason) I wanted to try a Border Patrol or similar DAC was to see if it could make some less than ideal CD's more pleasant to listen to. Just to satisfy my curiosity, nothing more.

I also don't think I can tell the differences between DAC's anymore than you can.

 

There is a broad misunderstanding that the whole (or even even the majority of a DAC’s sound) is simply the character of the “chip “ used. This leads to further conjecture that expensive DACs are silly because chips are constantly being upgraded and improved, thereby leading to obsolescence.

A DAC is a component, just like any of your other components. It has a power supply of some sort, switches and selectors, a case, and most importantly - an analog stage. Chips affect design principles and therefore affect sound, but I don’t think most designers would tell you that rapidly changing chip selections are necessarily a good thing, or a needed thing, for high end audio.

Truth be told, power supply and everything in the power chain is almost more important in the digital realm than it is in the analog realm. You may notice that power cord upgrades and quality filtering and choke devices have a greater effect on sound when connected to digital sources. This is why most mega buck DACs have heavy, expensive to build internal power supplies, similar to a quality amplifier. Good designers also follow the other rules of Audio design as well - shorter signal paths, fewer connections and switches, and galvanic isolation of various inputs but especially USB. Many have heavy, inert cases (vibrations and electro -magnetic interference have a huge affect on overall sound in a digital component). This is where the money goes in a very high end component - and they really can’t be compared in this regard to an inexpensive DACs which are more of a circuit board in a box with an external switching power supply.

That said, a good sounding a DAC need not be crazy expensive, either in retail cost or in build cost. Look at the Border Patrol DACs, which are made with inexpensive little cases and very old chips incapable of higher digital resolutions - and they sound amazing because their design is solid. It’s not necessarily the old chips that sound great in this case - it’s the design and implementation of these old chips in this particular DAC that creates the real magic here.

Audio designer Ed Meitner off EMM Labs/Meitner Audio Design was so disillusioned by the rapidly changing chip market that he decided a while ago to just design and build his own proprietary chips for use in his DACs. He controls all of the design perimeters and supply chain, and can make this variable a constant in his designs. Anyone that has heard his stuff can attest that it works. He also stresses the importance of the analogue part of the D to A conversion process. Ayre follows similar design goals with their DACs (power supply, discrete components, and balanced circuitry), as did Schitt’s own Mike Moffat, when he was at Theta Digital.