Musical Fidelity M1 DAC

[Cressy Snr]

I've had quite a good week in terms of sound quality improvements to the system.
First, the Apple TV update has improved the sound quality of the optical digital ouput. Secondly I today became the owner of a Musical Fidelity M1 DAC

After the death of my father and his funeral, on Tuesday of this week, I had been feeling a bit down.
Today I had one of those "what the hell, life's too short" moments
and went out and bought said DAC from Moorgate Acoustics in Sheffield; an early Christmas present if you like.

Very nice it is too, and a very useful improvement on the Beresford TC7510 DAC I have run for the past couple of years.

It is beautifully built on the outside as well as inside, with a substantial CLC power supply, 24 bit 192KHz Delta Sigma dual differential DAC chip and upsampling of digital inputs to 24/192.

It has four inputs Optical, coaxial, balanced digital and USB. A row of LEDs show the incoming sample frequency,
which tells me that my Apple TV outputs a 24bit 48KHz data stream. The ATV is capable of outputting 24/96
but sadly, my 6 and a half years old iMac G5 will only stream at 48KHz, so until I upgrade the Mac I won't get the benefit of very hi-rez playback.

Still, the 24 bit 48KHz Linn downloads I have still play at the correct resolution.

Sound wise the M1 DAC is a significant step up from the passive modded Beresford DAC. It really is a gorgeous sounding unit. The best I have heard from digital so far.

Again Ali was right on the money at Eggborough when he noted an indistinct quality to the bass.
We've already exonerated the speakers in another thread, now it looks like the Beresford DAC was also contributing
to the lack of bass performance, as the M1 is tight, textured and wonderfully tuneful at the bottom end.

Actually, the AppleTV software update and the purchase of the M1 DAC has
me questioning the need to go for transmitter triode amplification.
I'm in serious danger of becoming complacent

[Ali Tait]

Great stuff Steve,glad it's made such an improvement. Like to hear the dac sometime,along with the forthcoming Audiolab dac,which has been getting some hype. As for the bass issue, did your Beresford have the passive mod? If so,what value cap did you use?

[Cressy Snr]

Great stuff Steve,glad it's made such an improvement. Like to hear the dac sometime,along with the forthcoming Audiolab dac,which has been getting some hype. As for the bass issue, did your Beresford have the passive mod? If so,what value cap did you use?

Hi Ali

The Beresford had 0.47uF Claritycaps on the output.

Re the M1 DAC:
There are numerous bits of chat on the interweb, that the M1 DAC is nothing more than a VDAC in a nice box with an extra input.
TBH, I've never read such a load of bollocks in my life.

Here's a link showing the insides of each DAC.

http://www.ippinkan.com/m1_dac_musicalfidelity.htm
Apart from the completely different component layout,
the fact that there are 8 ICs is the VDAC as opposed to 6 in the M1,
the quartz crystal clock generator looks different
the VDAC is full of ceramic disc caps whilst the M1 has tantalum caps.

Apart from all this, it's the same DAC, cos it uses the same 24/192 Delta-Sigma chip as the VDAC so MF must be ripping you off
(yeah right)

Steve

[Nick]

Though to be fair Steve from the two pictures its clear there is some common features. The MF DAC seems to have a duplicate analogue output stage. Can't see why it would be a problem either way, small changes can make big differences, so the basic design could be the same and the result very different.

[Ali Tait]

Ah,used the same value myself,but I wonder if a higher value would've been better. Mine died so I bought a Valab NOS 2 box dac from ebay. This has passive output but uses 10uF. Much better bass was my immediate impression. Different dac I know,but I suspect the cap value does make the difference.

[Nick]

I would say it depends on what you are driving through the cap. I would never use 0.47u to the outside world, its ok inside a amp where you know what it has to drive, but for output caps I find 3u3 is a minimum safe value.

[Andrew]

I would say it depends on what you are driving through the cap. I would never use 0.47u to the outside world, its ok inside a amp where you know what it has to drive, but for output caps I find 3u3 is a minimum safe value.

At least 3u3 into 10K load, wot some SS amps provide as inputs - that gives you something like 8Hz.

Andrew

[Cressy Snr]

Though to be fair Steve from the two pictures its clear there is some common features. The MF DAC seems to have a duplicate analogue output stage. Can't see why it would be a problem either way, small changes can make big differences, so the basic design could be the same and the result very different.

I totally agree Nick,

Trouble is some folks (not here) seem to think that some commercial manufacturers are taking the proverbial and simply make cosmetic changes to a product so they can sell it for twice the price.

I mean you can have two cars with the same engine but different performance,
depending on the engine mapping, suspension setup, tyre profiles and all the rest of it, yet few would balk at paying more for the souped up car than the standard (if that's what they wanted)

Personally I have a lot of time for Musical Fidelity and have used quite a few of their products in the past. They make good stuff at reasonable prices.

The M1 is another example of the whole being much more than the sum of the parts.

It'd be interesting to compare a NOS (Non Over Sampling) DAC like the Valab to a LOOS (Loads Of Over Sampling) one like the MF. But without the Eurythmics

My 0.47uF caps were driving a 100K input so the -3dB point was at approx 3Hz. I would have thought that was low enough.

Steve

[Ali Tait]

Yes,I thought the same Steve,driving the 100k Pre 2, but the Valab was definately better in the bass. May be down to the dac rather than the output cap though.

[Ali Tait]

BTW,hope I didn't offend you at Eggy Steve, I like to think we all know each other well enough to be honest about what we hear without any offence being taken. I only ever mean what I say constructively

[Cressy Snr]

BTW,hope I didn't offend you at Eggy Steve, I like to think we all know each other well enough to be honest about what we hear without any offence being taken. I only ever mean what I say constructively

No I wasn't offended Ali

It is just these sorts of observations from other people that lead to improvements in our systems. You get used to the sound of your own gear and it's nice when somebody else can listen to it with a fresh pair of ears.

Steve

[floppybootstomp]

An interesting read chaps

I've never considered using an external DAC, I would assume it's usually used with a CD player and has the optical input plugged in and analogue out to line level?

Other digital sources? TV?

Other digital outputs from CD player? Perhaps CD player mechanism only?

I really don't know, so forgive my ignorance and some enlightenment would be good.

And presumably some DAC's will improve the quality of digital sources?

[Ali Tait]

I have two-the Valab and an Audionote.I use the AN on my Squeezebox for moozic,and the Valab hangs off the end of our Sky+ box. Both are definately an improvement on the analogue output stages of the sources.

[Mike H]

Mr. F I have to admit I too am in the stone age as regards DAC's and things, though I can see how there could be improvements made over what "the great unwashed" are typically given and expect to hear from their gear


For example, download pristine high quality music files then listen to them on their mobile phones