As an m903 owner, I've been waiting for your impressions of this product since you first mentioned you were going to do a review. I look for as many opinions as I can, and find them all interesting. Good job pointing out the features, flexibility, and high quality of this headphone amp/DAC. I've been using it as the pre-amp/DAC in my main speaker based system, as well as using it for occasional headphone listening, for several months. Prior to this I was using the m902. The capabilities of these units are hard to beat, though the m903 is considerably better both sonically and functionally.<br />
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I appreciate the forthright opinions in the review, but was a little surprised at the perfunctory headphone section of the review, considering the Grace m903 is primarily a headphone amplifier as indicated on the front of the unit. I can't remember where, but I recall reading an offhand comment from Grace indicating that the line output devices are not of the same quality as the headphone output. I have confirmed they do use different output amplification devices.<br />
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It doesn't negate your impressions at all, but putting your primary review focus strongly on what might arguably be considered the secondary function of a product is something to be considered when looking at the review in general.<br />
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I can not agree or disagree with your judgment of the sound of the m903 through the line output. Though it sounds very good to me, I have not compared it with other similar high end pre-amp/DACs, but I trust that your comparison to the three times as expensive Berkeley Audio Design Alpha DAC Series 2, and to your memory of the Bel Canto DAC 1.5 were honest assessments. At least I can take comfort that you preferred the m903 over the Benchmark DAC1 HDR, which I also considered buying at one time.
