Just got a Yggdrasil!

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I just received a Schiit Yggdrasil DAC. Simply incredible sound!  Yes, $2300 is fairly expensive, but a comparably priced competitor is most assuredly a Delta-Sigma design while the YGGY is a single-bit ladder DAC.  The only other High-end ladder DAC is from MSB (Diamond V) and is more than 10X the price and from what I hear from others whose opinions I value, sounds "comparable". This makes the YGGY an incredible bargain. This example is still stabilizing WRT operating temperature, and sounds better every day*. I was really surprised at the size and weight of the YGGY. I was expecting the thing to be the same size and weight as most other Schiit products, I.E., component half-width (9") by about 2" high. This thing weighs 25 pounds and is 16"wide by about 4" high and probably 12" deep. So far, I have but one "complaint". It needs a remote control to switch between digital sources, and to change absolute phase from one's listening position (right now, you have to get-up to accomplish either). A minor niggle would be that the legends above each light on the front panel are tiny and difficult  (make that nigh impossible) to read. No matter, any DAC that sounds this good for this price is entitled to a few minor shortcomings!

 

 

 

*This not the same as the notion of "burning-in" because if I turn the thing off for any reason, it would take another 5 or so days to get it back to the same point it was before cutting the power, 

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3 hours ago, Speed Racer said:

Multibit....not single-bit.

 

Once you get your Yggdrasil burned-in, it only take about 48 hours to get it to a thermally stable state from cold.

 

Yeah, my bad WRT the multi-bit/single bit business. Thanks for the correction. I don't know what I was thinking

 

Electronics of that type don't "burn-in" as in improving performance. Burn-in is only to weed out units that fail due to "infant mortality", The DAC does need to thermally stabilize, however. Even Mike Moffat says that. 

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37 minutes ago, Speed Racer said:

 

Well, there are plenty of people out there, including me from personal experience with my Yggdrasil, that would disagree with you!

 

Can you describe the mechanism, at the component level, for this "burn-in? What changes over the burn-in interval? I can understand thermal stabilization on a multi-bit Ladder (R2R) DAC. The values of the resistors in the ladder need to stabilize at their optimum resistance to minimize quantization error. Delta-Sigma DACs don't need this because they are single-bit over-sampled DACs. That's why most DAC units contain Delta-Sigma ICs. They are easier and cheaper to produce than are multi-bit R2R Dacs due to the precision required for the latter. 

Simplified block diagram of a Delta-Sigma DAC

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13 hours ago, TubeLover said:

Congrats on the Yggy. Wonderful DAC, and a "best buy" for the money. 

 

JC

Since it and a $35,000 MSB Diamond V DAC sound pretty much identical, I'd say that it was more than just a "good buy" (I borrowed one over last weekend).

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1 hour ago, GUTB said:

It's a 20-bit DAC in a 32-bit world. But more to the point, it doesn't support DSD or DXD.

 

Native DSD is very very good and DXD sounds amazing. A Yggdrasil owner will never get to enjoy those.

 

Also, high end DACs can resolve 24 bits of high definition audio...the Yggdrasil can't.

 

With all due respect, WRT DSD and DXD, saying that Yggy owners will never get to enjoy these is something you can't possibly know. The Yggy was designed to be upgradable and has multiple daughter boards to facilitate adding function. In fact, the front panel has an extra LED that is not being used put there to allow for just such an upgrade. Mike Moffat decided to not support Direct Stream Digital initially, because he felt that there wasn't enough call for it and he wanted to concentrate on getting the LPCM right. He told me that if DSD ever became a major market consideration, that he would add it to the Yggy, hence the unused resolution light on the front panel!

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6 hours ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

 

Schiit are straight up heretics to the Pharisees over at Stereophile.  They've killed a LOT of other companies DAC products with their demonstratively disruptive DAC line.  Look how long it's taking for iFi to roll out the new iDSD Pro.  They're more than a year behind their original release date.  Is the Yggy the "end all" DAC?  Certainly not.  Is it one of the best sounding DACs available at its price?  I think so, and they're certainly sold a lot of them and even more Gumbys and Mimbys.  Might someone thinking about spending $5,000 on a DAC settle for a Yggy?  Quite possibly.  And THAT is what the "old guard" audiophile companies really hate about Schiit.

 

One dig I have about Schiit DACs:  the USB interfaces are electrically fragile.  I've had the USB board replaced in my Yggy and I've encountered a surprising number of others reporting the same thing about Yggys and Gumbys.  Since I got an iFi iLink, I just stopped using the USB port and stopped worrying about it.  And I think S/PDIF or AES/EBU sounds better on the Yggy anyway.

 

 

SPDIF and AES/EBU sound better than USB, anyway.

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1 hour ago, GUTB said:

Also, here is the MSB Diamond IV's 24-bit sine wave:

 

And the Yggdrasil's:

 

OUCH!

 Doesn't matter. They still sound essentially identical. I still don't quite understand why you are so negative about the Yggy. What other DAC in this price range performs anywhere near as well (especially if you don't have to use USB!). I would expect a $35,000 DAC Like the MSB Diamond V to beat the pants off a sub $2500 DAC. That it doesn't speaks to the diminishing returns of increasing cost vs performance.

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2 hours ago, manisandher said:

 

Auralic seem to have made better ones

 

Mani.

 

I currently have an Auralic Aries in house for evaluation, and I don't think it's on-board DAC sounds all that good. Like most low-end DACs it sounds OK, but for my money, the Yggy blows it out of the water. Let me share this anecdote with you: Back in the early 1960's I bought an LP of Ormandy/Philadelphia playing some short Scandinavian pieces: Grieg, Hugo Alfen, Sibelius, etc. On it was the best performance of Finlandia that I had ever heard. It remains the only recording of this work (that I know of) that includes a choir (Mormon Tabernacle) along with the orchestra. I love the effect with the singers, but with the record, I was never able to make out most of the lyrics. When digital came along, I waited patiently for these performances to come out on CD. Well it took decades, but finally about 2 years ago, Sony released these performances on CD and I bought it. Imagine my chagrin when I found out that I still couldn't make out the chorus' lyrics with any DAC I tried! Well, after the Yggy settled-in for a week, I tried this Finlandia rendition again. For the first time, I can parse the lyrics from just listening to the CD. To me that's impressive and speaks volumes about the performance of the Schiit Yggdrasil! 

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16 hours ago, manisandher said:

 

What parts of my post were crap?

 

That the Yggy has zero-crossing glitching distortion?

That I personally didn't like the sound of the Yggy when I had it here for a few weeks?

That the Yggy has problems with high level, high frequency tones?

That the Yggy has problems with the LSBs of 24-bit data?

 

You don't have to get all upset just because my opinion of the Yggy is different to yours.

 

Mani.

Well, since the newest DACs don't have those "characteristics" any more (much has been changed of late it could well be that you are we are talking apples and oranges, here.. I'm not at liberty to say what all has been changed, and the Yggy that I have is ostensibly one of the first to incorporate those changes. Needless to say, that I doubt seriously that the DAC you tried and the one I was sent do not sound the same.

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13 hours ago, Ralf11 said:

 

 

Yes, I saw that - I need at least 3 inputs and ability to switch between them by remote.

The inability to switch between inputs remotely is one of the few shortcomings I've found WRT the Yggy.

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5 hours ago, 4est said:

S/PDIF = Sony/Phillips Digital Interconnect Format

 SDIF must be a Sony-only format, perhaps the one they came up with for DSD.

 

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3 hours ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

 

I agree.  They seem to be coming around slowly.  The Freya has a remote (the only Schiit product that does, I believe).

 

The Ragnarok integrated amp has a remote, I believe.

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3 hours ago, LarryMagoo said:

A DAC with a Volume control ??? Kinda like a NAS with a volume control...it does not make sense!   

 

15 DACs...Yikes...do you have a problem with commitment? 

 

Streamers with Volume control..makes sense...straight DACs...not so much!

 

I have at least six at the moment: The Yiggy, the Modi 2 Multibit, The Auralic Aries, The Dragonfly Red, Assemblage (Sonic Frontiers) DAC2, And the dual differential DAC in my HK900.  I've probably overlooked one or two. Chris is a reviewer, so am I. I'm sure that like me, he often has a few too many of something laying around. 

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3 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

DACs with volume control makes a lot of sense to me. I usually have a single digital source and single analog output. 

 

It makes a lot of sense if your sources are strictly digital. Then you only need your source component(s), your DAC and a stereo power amp. No need for a preamp when your system has no analog sources. 

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3 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

I actually believe the last 1% can only be achieved with built-in volume control (analog or digital). A preamp adds another set of cables and a lot of circuitry to traverse just to control volume. 

 

I might point out that Schiit makes a 2-input analog switch/passive volume control called a Sys for 50 bucks. It's extra cables, but no extra active circuitry.

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4 hours ago, LarryMagoo said:

The new Oppo disc player will have the Sabre ESS 9038 chip, just like their new Sonica.  From my experience owning their 105 Disc player as well as their HA-1 HP Amp/DAC.  The Sabre DAC is way harsh compared to the Yggy...in fact there is literally no comparison ...> I have read reviews on the Sonica, and they have said, although much better than the 9018 and 9028 chips, the Sabre Glare is still there.

 

I still use my HA-1 as my Headphone amp (class A with plenty of grunt for my HD 800S), but use it with the Yggy DAC instead.   

 

As far as remote control goes, the HA-1 has an excellent remote to control my Headphone volume.

 

I agree with you here. While the Sabre DACs might be excellent Delta-Sigma DAC chips, they're still 1-bit oversampling DACs and those never sound as good as an R2R DAC. My 12-year old Assemblage DAC2 is a R2R DAC and it sounds better than essentially any Delta-Sigma based DACs that have passed through my hands in the ensuing  years. It's only 24/96 but then 99.99% of all my digital material is 24/96 or lower, so that's OK. The Yggy blows it out of the water, of course, but then I would hope the state-of-the-art has improved in 12 years!

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11 hours ago, manisandher said:

 

OK, shall we try again then?

 

1. The Yggy has zero-crossing glitching distortion.

 

 

JA referred to these as "significant errors at the signal's zero-crossing points" [highlight mine]. Perhaps these are inaudible, but perhaps they're not.

 

2. The Yggy has problems with high level, high frequency tones.

 

 

I had a quick look at the other DACs Stereophile had reviewed and couldn't find anything anywhere near as bad as this. Do you really think this is going to be inaudible?

 

3. The Yggy has problems with the LSBs of 24-bit data.

 

 

The 24 bit noise is correlated with the signal, and peaks up above the 16 bit noise at certain points. You don't think this is going to be audible?

 

So, what are your counter-arguments?

 

Mani.

Since all that spuriae shown in your #2 and #3 is more than 120 dB down, you're damn right, it's inaudible! I guess some people could make an argument about the Auralic's shortcomings being more inaudible than the Yggy's, but that's a lot like arguing about who killed more of their own people, Stalin or Mouse Dung. Or how many angels can fit on the head of a pin. Both arguments are ultimately irrelevant, as is the one you are trying to make. Specs are useful, if they are used by people who understand what they are looking at. Showing a comparison between two pieces of gear where the imperfections of both are below the threshold of human hearing, and way below the self noise of your (or anybody else's) amplifier, the output amplifier stages of either of the two DACs in question, and certainly below the noise floor of any recordings your going to play on either is an exercise in "not understanding all you know about the subject".

On the other hand, the DAC glitch in the Yggy, certainly looks bad on paper, but I certainly can't hear any sonic anomaly in the Yggy that I could attribute to that glitch. You should really listen to gear before condemning it based on measurements that you don't seem to understand.

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1 hour ago, Norton said:

 

George,

 

re. the wording of your posts in this thread, can  I ask, politely, whether you have  a  relationshipship with the company beyond simply being a satisfied paying customer?

I have no relationship with the company, but I have known Mike Moffat (casually from running in to him at CES, AND HI-Fi shows) for many years, and I have met Jason Stoddard. I'm a reviewer and the Yiggy I have is a review sample and is not mine. I'm just extremely impressed with the unit's sonic performance.

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2 hours ago, Jud said:

 

He did.

 

This is not intended to comment on audibility of what's shown on the graphs, just to point out that mani indeed did listen to the Yggy for some time, as he's mentioned in this thread and others.  He wound up not liking it; again, I'm not intending to comment on whether anything shown in the graphs could have been the reason.

 

I've probably got my responders mixed-up. When you say "he did" are you referring to Speed Racer or Mani? One of them said he hadn't actually listened to the Yaggy. I forget. Which... Anyway, to whichever one I'm not talking about, my apologies!

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1 hour ago, earnmyturns said:

It makes a lot a sense to people with an axe to grind to make measurements that purport to help their cause. Any sufficiently complex nonlinear system is vulnerable to crafted adversarial inputs that cause it to output something that does not conform to expected input-output characteristics. Whether that matters depend on whether adversarial inputs occur in the wild. Axe-grinders put a lot of effort seeking the adversarial inputs that help their point. Those with better things to do will roll their eyes and move on.

 

+1

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13 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

To turn it another way, you must think all measurements matter?

 

If one component has noise at -150 dB and another at -140 dB, does it actually matter?

No, it does not, as one can hear neither.

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1 hour ago, Ralf11 said:

What does the crossover distortion sound like?

The Yggy's "glitch" sounds like nothing, because you can't hear it (and it's not exactly crossover distortion. If you look closely you'll see that it's not at the zero-crossing point, but rather it's a little positive). But if you want to hear REAL crossover distortion, find an old, functioning Dynaco Stereo 120. It's the real thing and is caused by the the fact that the S120 tends to run heavily Class B. This means that that one half of the 2N3055 output pair stops conducting before the other half starts conducting. The reason for this seems to be that the transistors of the era were slow to turn on and off, I don't know to what to attribute the glitch that Atkinson found in the Yggy, Some say it's attributed to the DAC chips and others say that Atkinson goofed and the Yggy "glitch" really isn't there... I don't know.

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12 hours ago, mansr said:

It's an intriguing philosophy, but one that doesn't pan out in reality. Sigma-delta was invented because direct conversion wasn't good enough.

Not exactly.  Sigma-Delta was chosen as the most popular Integrated circuit based DAC  because they are easier (and much cheaper) to make in a single chip than are R2R DACs, which need their resistor networks to be ultra precision to avoid gross quantization errors. Single-bit DACs don't have that requirement.

Believe me, when executed properly, an R2R DAC can be much more accurate. Ask the folks at MSB.

 

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3 hours ago, Ralf11 said:

I'm curious which brands and vintages of nice sports cars you like, George(?)

 

More on topic, what DACs at or near or under the price of the Yggy sound better or as good?  Mytek Brooklyn?  others?

 

And feel free to limit the response by digital format (redbook) or music type (rock vs. jazz, classical), blind testing or sustained listening or wayward impressions -- all welcome.

 

 

Italian ones. Specifically, pre-Fiat Alfa Romeos. 

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47 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

That top one reminds me of the GTV my dad had in the late 1970's. He would take me to the SCCA autocross (timed through cones) events so I could watch him run it up through second gear...

 

Similar body but your dad's car did not have the "power bulge" in the hood, because his car had a 2.0 liter inline-4 motor, while my car in the picture has a 3-liter V-6 outputting about 250 horsepower at the flywheel (about 220 bhp net). Mine is not stock, having about 75 bhp over the factory spec. The model is called a GTV-6, and the year was '86. The silver one is a '72 GTV And it has the same motor as your dad's, but a different body. Both cars are mint.