Berkeley Audio Design Alpha DAC RS - Impressions and Information

[fjmcsu]

This post was initially placed in the other BADA DAC thread and I have copied and updated some of the information. Please feel free to skip this if this is a rehash for you! I thought it would be best placed in this thread.

 

I received the new Alpha reference approximately 10 days ago, serial#1002 courtesy of Maier Shadi of the Audio Salon. I thank him much for the hard work and guidance he has given me in getting this DAC. Those who are familiar with the previous Alpha series 1 & 2 will be right at home as most controls and inputs are similar except 2 SPDIF inputs are present on the new DAC. The remote is also new and of course the unit itself is very well constructed and much heavier than the other alphas.

I previously used the BADA series 1 with and without the Alpha USB box. The combination of the Aurender 20>USB> alpha USB > AES > reference works extremely well & the isolation given to the system with this approach seems to contribute to the lack of height frequency harshness I mention in the next paragraph (it seemed the Alpha USB helped in this regard with the series 1 also).

The Constellation Audio Perseus is my reference for analogue playback & its ability to mainatin detail and clarity and at the same time great tonality is the hallmark of the Perseus and I have noted the same for the new reference BADA. Upper frequency harshness is minimal to non existent & again the lower frequency punch is easily noted particularly in HDCD files!

Conclusively this has been a major improvement in SQ for my system and look forward to more long term listening!