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Apogee Duet


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I think there are a few mentions the Duet on the site, mostly using it as a DAC rather than a recording interface. It generally gets a thumbs up.

 

You can also find mention of it in the forums on

 

www.soundonsound.com

 

As you can tell, I prowled around the Duet myself. Love the look of it but think I'll need more inputs.

 

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Yes Larrry, I have recently purchased an Apogee Duet and the sound is very musical with a large three dimensional sound stage, and on good recordings you can pinpoint the performers on that stage.

 

It is a two channel firewire audio interface made for Apple Mac computers, and can be used as a DAC between your Mac and your stereo. You can also use it to record using Garageband, Logic, Final Cut Studio etc.

 

I recently auditioned a Weiss DAC2 firewire DAC (which is the Recording Industry version of the Minerva), and have found the Apogee Duet to sound as good. However the price is what really persuaded me, the Weiss DAC2 is AU$5,000 to AU$6,000 (Australian dollars), while the Apogee Duet was AU$779, about one seventh the price.

 

It is available for that price at the Australian Apple Store with free shipping.

 

There is further talk about the Apogee Duet on the forum "Hifi Vs Computer Audiophile DAC's", where some comments have included how equipment made for the recording field using computers is as good as or better than so called Audiophile products. The only difference being the recording industry products are much cheaper, you are not being gouged, like you are with the so called High End industry.

 

I hope these comments help.

 

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Oooooh! Now *very* excited about the arrival of the Duet! You couldn't have phrased a review better for me Blu! That's exactly what I'm looking for - musical with a wide sound stage. I've had to rely on reviews as I've not been able to audition any DACs before purchase - that is one BIG difference between consumer hifi and studio equipment: I can't just pop down to my local hifi retailer and listen.

 

Alix/Voyage mpd -> Valab NOS DAC (modded) -> Linn Majic I -> B&W CM7

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I have three DACs at the moment, an Apogee Duet, a Stello DA100, and a Weiss DAC2. Because they are all small and light weight, it is easy to move them around from system to system to compare them. The two systems I listened to fairly carefully in are my living room rig: CAT Ultimate -> Art Audio Jota monos -> Verity Parsifal Encore speakers, and my headphone rig: Yamamoto HA-02 -> Audio Technica W5000. Both are from iTunes on a MacBook Pro.

 

I don't have the time or energy to try to write a detailed analysis, but it's easy to perceive differences, and there's no way that I would say that the Duet is equal to the DAC2. I love the Duet for its versatility. I use it for digitizing LPs, and the results please me. However for playback I would say

 

Apogee Duet < Stello DA100

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Thanks Ron for your comments, I think you are right, I just found that I could enjoy my music just as much from the Apogee Duet as the Weiss DAC2 but at one tenth the cost.

 

Then of course their is the fact that the Duet is 24/96 while the DAC2 is 24/192. Also you can use the Duet as an ADC.

 

How does your vinyl sound after digitizing with the Duet? I ask as I want to do the same thing with all my vinyl albums. What are you using on the Mac to do that?

 

Best regards, Blu

 

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The Duet makes digitizing LPs an easy process. I take the signal from my preamp to the Duet and use Sound Studio software. If I were to do this over again, I'd be very tempted to use Wave Editor instead. I still might try it sometime to compare.

 

As I mentioned before, I like to use ClickRepair and DeNoise to clean up the files before going back to Sound Studio to normalize and split into tracks. Most LPs turn out very well. Played back through the DAC2 they are more or less indistinguishable from the original LPs, except for an uncanny absence of surface noise and clicks.

 

There are some records that don't fare well, though. I have found no way to deal with groove damage. Probably the best thing to do in that case is to look for another copy or buy the CD.

 

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