Grant Fidelity Tubedac-11

[marvda1]

my review of the grant fidelity tubedac-11 is now up on stereomojo.
http://stereomojo.com/Grant%20Audio%...oTubeDAC11.htm

[thsmith]

Nice write up Marvin, thank you.

[mhardy6647]

Out of academic curiosity, did you post a link to your review over at their forum on AK?

[marvda1]

i thought about it but they were sent an email from stereomojo letting them know the review was up and thought it was best to let them post it. the reason i posted it here was due to the fact we have members comparing dacs. by the way i bought the review sample to use as a dac and backup preamp. over on audiocircle wayne at boulder has a $250 mod for the tubedac-11.
i'll see if i can find the link.

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=103703.0

[mhardy6647]

ahhh, excellent. Makes sense; thanks.

[FTGV]

Thanks for posting.From your impressions it appears to be another good budget contender.

[marvda1]

now i would like to hear the boulder mod.

[pietro944]

my review of the grant fidelity tubedac-11 is now up on stereomojo.
http://stereomojo.com/Grant%20Audio%...oTubeDAC11.htm

I have something that is very similar:Xiang Sheng Dac-02A......I paid $245 w/free shipping from HK.....came in 10 days.......i changed the tube to the Sylvania 5670.......well-built,works flawlessly,very impressive.I'm using it with the Yaqin CD-3 Tube Buffer with upgraded Jan Phillips 6922 Green Labels......Total for both was $410.

Really happy with this combo for $450 with the upgraded tubes.....it was a nice score....peter

[DSkip]

Going to piggy back on your thread Marvin.

He was kind enough to let me borrow this unit for the past week. I've done some listening, all through USB because that's all I'm really interested in right now. What I've found is I like the sound overall, but I'll go into a little more detail.

The unit has 3 different outputs: DAC only, Solid State through Pre, and Tube through Pre. I've found that for my system, the Solid State/Pre output sounds the best. Its still slightly cold-sounding, but the detail is superb and lacks the image-smearing that I've had in my system for quite a while. There's still good weight to the music, it just not quite as warm as the Tube output. The tube output sounds nice, but it isn't much of a change over the BDP was. Its a little more clear, but less engaging (although more engaging than the Solid State output admittedly). The DAC only output didn't do anything for me. I thought I'd prefer this over the Solid State output, but I didn't. It's a little more recessed presentation than the SS/tube provide. One thing that really put the SS output over the top was the open, airy sound. My speakers completely disappeared which has never really happened before. The Tube/DAC outputs don't quite have the same sound. Compared to the SS, they are somewhat veiled in presentation. It sounds as though it just don't want to allow the music to open up.

I like the unit enough to seriously consider getting one in the near future. I'm curious how some tube rolling would treat the tube output (this unit still has the stock tube), but I think I'd be content enough simply using the SS output to not worry about it.