antonisgr

english is NOT my native language anyhow is difficult for me to express all the audiophile terms even in Greek since i'm not a professional journalist-reviewer

i really want your opinion on something i had on my system benchmark dac 1 usb and later moved up to weiss minerva which i also sold once i installed a sony scd-xa5400es( system consists of the b&w 802d and classe cp500&ca-2200 ) i also tested but not thorougly just for a couple of hours a weiss 202 dac and i didn't like it ( it was too shiny if may say and lacked lower body ) i had for 1 week a heed dactilus dac and the naim dac the heed is a great product for its price point ( 1500eur ) but that wasn't exactly what i want in sound terms the naim is very close to what i'm searching sound wise ( full bodied with detail and very relaxed and naturally timbre ) its the dac that suits my taste better than anything i owned or heard on my system BUT surfing the net i saw many ads with dacs of the past 5 years (give or take) with very attractive prices i'm talking about accustic arts dac 1 mk4 - dcs delius - audio aero prima etc so if you would like to spend 2000-3000 eur would you buy a brand new dac or a higher priced used like the ones i mentioned please note that audition would not be possible for the old models

Hi As my primary use of my macbook is for listening to music through amarra and then weiss Minerva I had done many tests to understand the sound of the different versions Definitely the latest isn’t as good as the previous in matters of air around the instruments and the width of the soundstage .it is also a bit harder and as I read previously posted more like itunes sound and not amarra What I’m laughing about is that sonic has entered a world of paranoia ( high-end ) and will have troubles with this move I think the most satisfying for me is the 101 something version of the amarra mini which was the one that I auditioned before purchasing the amarra Does anyone know which is the best way to convert flacs and apes to aiff for being playable with amarra ? because I have done many conversions and some files play through amarra and some don’t

Ok firewire is an interface with two way communication In my MACBOOK I have 1 firewire which I use to connect the WEISS MINERVA The minerva now has two firewires If I connect one external firewire hard disk to the Minerva will I be able to control it through macbook? And if so would it be better if the hard disk will communicate directly with the dac and not through the macbook?

Some days ago I decided to trade my TOSHIBA HD-DVD EP30 for a PS3 which was my main source for viewing dvd’s So I started to remove the cables and get out of the rack the Toshiba and then I thought since is now of the rack why don’t I give it a try in the music room So I got the Toshiba with its 10 euro optical cable ( 3m long ) and plugged it into the WEISS MINERVA and ……………… The TOSHIBA definitely outperforms the combination of MACBOOK with Firewire as long that we are talking about redbook Of course after that I didn’t sell the Toshiba but I also tried a cheap Samsung dvd player as transport but throw it away after hearing only one cd So either the Toshiba is a machine from outer space OR again we have issues ( jitter or noise or … ) from the laptop playback I was also very negative concerning the use of optical cables from what I heard but I had similar experience with the benchmark dac 1 usb which was way better sounding with optical connection from the laptop than with the usb At last I should mention that playback of 24/96 flac’s are awesome with Minerva but I have ( probably also many of you ) 50 albums in this format and 2000 in red book

Update my friends I went and bought a macbook ( last one brand new with firewire ) Thank god is the internet and messing with the mac os x was easy so far I read plenty of things, downloaded play and plugged weiss Minerva in the firewire All I can say is that I’m stupid for messing with windows based computers and applications I also regret that I didn’t have the chance to listen via mac to my beloved BENCHMARK DAC 1 USB wich I traded 3 months ago for a WEISS MINERVA And this because I am now 100 % sure that for all the bad things responsible was and still is windows ( xp & vista& 7 ) And boy did I work it out ( from kimber usb cables to hundreds of hours listening to the changes between software players and asio ks ds etc I now spent easy 2-3 hours listening MUSIC Doesn’t matter what sort of music , everything is amazing via macbook and play I know that I had risked buying another laptop for 1000 euros but that happened before with cables My setup is now more musical , more detail + more relaxed ( much more ) Happy to answer anything else concerning this move that I made , GO MAC NOW!!!!!!!

Well thank you for your thoughts so far Indeed my laptop is set only for computer playback ( I have a desktop pc for all other uses email burning etc ) That includes only foobar working with asio on vista with sp2 and of course the latest drivers for the Weiss Minerva Let me note that I have been using the computer for playback long time ( I had the benchmark dac 1 usb ) and I definitely know many tips and tricks about xp vista kmixer and all But in MAC OS I’m total disrelated that’s why I aked p.s elloise a have a friend that have the same amplifier like yours ( a1008 ) excellent choice ( I have the kw250s )

Hello I need some help I never had an APPLE computer or laptop but recently I heard some rumors from friends that for computer playback apple is the way to go Now my configuration is an ACER laptop connected via firewire to the WEISS MINERVA using FOOBAR and I’m very pleased Will it be difficult for me the passage from windows to apple software? Will be noticeable changes in terms of audio quality playback through apple? Otherwise I’m not to young and I don’t have much time to start educating myself on APPLE Thank you in advance

Hello and greetings from sunny GREECE I’m into computer audio playback for nearly 3 years started with an soundblaster audigy 2 nx moved to benchmark dac1 usb and now weiss Minerva What I have noticed all this years is that every hard disk plays differently ( at least it sounds differently ) I have used disks from Seagate ,western digital ,Maxtor you name it and of different connection formats ( lan usb firewire ) So far only the internal hard disk is 100% acceptable to my ears I had in my acer laptop one 120 gigabytes changed it to 500 ( western digital ) but the whole thing keeps bothering me , and at least for me is the only drawback on computer audio Is anyone else listening to differences between hard disks playback?