Asio or Waspi for Benchmark DAC2

[Mark Manner]

I am testing a new Benchmark DAC2, utilizing the USB input with pcm 24/192 and DSD64, and note that it has both Asio and Wasapi drivers showing up in JRiver. Both seem to work fine for pcm and dsd. Any thoughts on which would be preferred?

Thanks

Mark

[andyv]

Hi - I have a Benchmark DAC2 (which is an excellent DAC imo) and use ASIO. JRiver say here that:

 

1) If your hardware has a native, well-behaved, ASIO driver, use ASIO.2) Otherwise, on Windows Vista, Windows 7, or newer, use WASAPI exclusive.

 

so it makes sense to go along with their advice.

 

A possible advantage using the custom ASIO driver is that you then get access to some extra driver settings. If you have selected the ASIO driver Click Tools > Options > Device Settings and you will see a button "Open Driver Control Panel" which gives you options to set the streaming mode and the buffer size. Fiddling with these may help if you have issues with drop-outs.

 

I believe it is also correct to set "Device uses only most significant 24 bits" and "DSD bitstream in DoP format" in Device Settings.

 

Having said that, I very much doubt there would be an audible difference between WASAPI and ASIO.

 

I'd be interested in your opinion of the DAC2 - I have found it to be really superb, smooth solid sounding, clean, enjoyable, great value.