Buying Emotiva Stealth DC-1 DAC /Preamplifier opinions please..

[Aanuj]

What I have realised over the years though my experience is very limited in my honest opinion, the difference between a proper front end a CD player having good DACs within and costing say about Rs 40,000 is very hard to better with a Rs 40,000 DAC imho if at all there is a difference the difference will be so subtle that it can be ignored unless you are looking at serious DACs costing over Rs 100000. It's then you start to feel the difference provided you have the rest of the chain which can show that difference. But if you spend the same amount of money on your speaker or pre amp the difference is right there in front of you. Lyrita makes very good tube pre amps and they are very decently priced. Cayin makes very very high quality pre amps and didn't cost the earth for eg the SC-6LS. This Cayin has very high quality parts inside with capacitors from Realcaps,Multical, Swellong and transistors from Motorolla. Cayin is OEM to Triode Corporation and Prima Luna! Prima Luna makes great pre amps for sane amount of money too. Keep an eye on Audiogon for great pre owned stuff and eBay USA too. I always believe a dedicated CD player is always better over the likes of OPPO, OPPO for reasons known to them are seriously overpriced which was not the case earlier,so to me they are no more as attractive as they used to be.

 

[drkrack]

What I have realised over the years though my experience is very limited in my honest opinion, the difference between a proper front end a CD player having good DACs within and costing say about Rs 40,000 is very hard to better with a Rs 40,000 DAC imho if at all there is a difference the difference will be so subtle that it can be ignored unless you are looking at serious DACs costing over Rs 100000. It's then you start to feel the difference provided you have the rest of the chain which can show that difference. But if you spend the same amount of money on your speaker or pre amp the difference is right there in front of you. Lyrita makes very good tube pre amps and they are very decently priced. Cayin makes very very high quality pre amps and didn't cost the earth for eg the SC-6LS. This Cayin has very high quality parts inside with capacitors from Realcaps,Multical, Swellong and transistors from Motorolla. Cayin is OEM to Triode Corporation and Prima Luna! Prima Luna makes great pre amps for sane amount of money too. Keep an eye on Audiogon for great pre owned stuff and eBay USA too. I always believe a dedicated CD player is always better over the likes of OPPO, OPPO for reasons known to them are seriously overpriced which was not the case earlier,so to me they are no more as attractive as they used to be.

That's a clear statement in favour of high end CD players, which aren't popular with the advent of external DACs. I'll keep the option of Upgrading to a better CD source sooner instead of investing in a better bluray player. I'm bit annoyed by most bluray players with DAC and even Oppo bd 203 don't have a remote control with volume control or other audio related options. Probably Manfacturers don't want you to listen to audio Cds in bluray player.

Cayin, Audiogon etc are bit above my budget even the pre-owned are equally expensive. I'll keep looking for them for sure, wouldn't a hybrid fit the bill? Because most of the above preamp don't come with the remote. I don't think I'll be getting something in this USA visit in that case as buying pre-owned stuff from ebay will require a good research. There don't seem to be good options in less than 50k budget currently else I should go with DC-1.
Thanks a lot for the reply, any experience about schiit tube preamps saga and Freya?

 

[drkrack]

Got Marantz CD 6006 as upgrade to my pioneer DVD player plus DAC setup. Dedicated CD player makes a very appreciable difference; will consider upgrading to a better CD player or a good dedicated Network player later this year. Upgraded the DAC to Schiit Gungnir as well, pretty much content with the SQ as of now.

Thanks @Aanuj for the inputs. Will keep watching for good tube preamps for a pre power setup later when budget permits or upgrade bug bites.


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[naj]

Update : there's problems with Emotiva site not accepting orders for DC1, any other sites that you can get it from? They've (Emotiva) stopped taking orders recently - mostly means a newer model might be in the horizon, sooner than expected.

This newer Tube preamp from schiit seems a good option though ; it has a remote too...

Schiit Audio, Headphone amps and DACs made in USA.

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Hello drkrack,

Just wanted to share : Apart from DC-1 , Emotiva has another good cheaper product , the PT- 100 , $299 ,which is a pre amp/ DAC / Tuner combo with a sub out .
Last year got this for a second stereo setup which am building for Just @ $230. It has phono , Aux inputs too.

Sound: My existing set up of XDA2 (DAC) and USP 1 Preamp together does sound better than the PT IMHO but that's subjective opinion .
When using the menu settings : They are a little complicated and one tends to forget what was done the last time . The menu has inbuilt Equalizer for bass / treble which works ok .

Since you have made your buy , this info can help others .
Website:https://emotiva.com/products/pres-and-pros/pt-100

Thanks,