Updating MBP, Audirvana - Sonics vs. Reliability?

[Jim Smith]

A long time ago, I quit upgrading Audirvana, as subsequent versions sounded worse to me.  So I went back to 1.5.10.  But time went by, and I never tried any 2 or 3 versions.

 

It wasn't broken, so I never tried to fix it (after experimenting with Audirvana 1.5.12, etc.).

 

I left my software at OSX, ver. 10.8 - Mountain Lion.

 

Still use my substantially stripped down MBP Retina only for listening, RoomPlay voicing and for RoomPlay Reference sessions here.  Most visitors think I am I using some HiRez files, but they are standard 16/44.1.

 

I do not want to get better sound at the risk of reliability.  This combo has always worked flawlessly for me.

 

However, it's probably way past time that I looked at later - and supposedly better - options.  Is there a combo level of OSX & Audirvana that has proven - without a doubt - to deliver even better sound, without software problems?

 

I realize that this is a broad - and dated - question.  If any have been down this path successfully, I would greatly appreciate suggestions.

 

Best,

 

Jim Smith

 

[copy_of_a]

23 hours ago, Jim Smith said:

It wasn't broken, so I never tried to fix it (after experimenting with Audirvana 1.5.12, etc.).

 

I left my software at OSX, ver. 10.8 - Mountain Lion.

 

However, it's probably way past time that I looked at later - and supposedly better - options.  Is there a combo level of OSX & Audirvana that has proven - without a doubt - to deliver even better sound, without software problems?

On your stripped down Mountain Lion you could (and should) try Audirvana 2.5.4.

It does not only has a pretty good library but also for instance DSD upsampling.

I also think overall it sounds better than 1.5.10.

[watercourse]

I've stuck with Yosemite and have had no issues with stability. I had Audirvana 1.5.12 on both Snow Lion and Yosemite, and found A+ version 2 to sound better prior to trying out v3. By the time I switched over to Yosemite, Mountain Lion was not available as a free download, so I opted to go to Yosemite a little over a year ago. Now, I believe that Yosemite is no longer free. Yosemite is more responsive by far than Snow Lion, and Yosemite icons feel less "dated"... if these kinds of user experience are factors for you at all. That said, I had to buy new versions of software to run on Yosemite.

 

I just listened to 1.5.12 on my SD card boot side, which I haven't done for quite a while. I discovered that I cannot upsample in 1.5.12 any longer (possibly a glitch I can fix, but I didn't research this further for this quick comparison). To keep things more apples-to-apples, I listened to both versions of Audirvana with files played without upsampling and let my DAC to the heavy lifting. So we are listening to only the playback engine of each version without iZotope filtering (I had Exclusive Access Mode, Direct Mode, and System Optimizer on Extreme for both trials).

 

Compared with v3, 1.5.12 has a much more rounded, warm, enveloping sound at the expense of some detail. The hallmarks of version 3 IMHO are significant improvements in detail, texture, and dynamics, probably most noticeable in bass quality. There is also a deeper soundstage, greater transparency, and more ease to the overall sound.

 

If you don't need streaming, library management, and DSD upsampling, 1.5 still sounds good, but I vastly prefer v3 (which I would suggest over version 2). I was intending to listen to a few tracks from a number of albums, but ended up listening to the entire "Art of Conversation" album because it sounded so good on v3.