Mytek Stereo 192

[petecare]

Hello

Mytek ordered ! It's on the way home...

I read the F*****g manual. And as you can see on my avatar, my language is french. Not easy and so I ask some help for understanding.

ie page 9 : "FireWire 400 Port. 6-pin computer interface. Can be used withFireWire 400 > FireWire 800 cable or Firewire 400>Thunderbolt.192kHz/DSD capable. "

My external card (Impact Twin) is hooked up on my iMac (mid 2011 & Mountain Lion) with a Oyaide Neo firewire cable.

(400>800) . Can I used the same cable firewire and plugged on the Thunderbolt connector ??

Maybe an adaptator is need...

The manual is not very clear.

[Esprit]

I'm using a 800->400 (9->6) FW cable (A normal cable. Previous 4 meters now only one). If you cannot use the firewire of your Mac there is the solution of the thunderbolt to FW adapter.

[petecare]

Hi Esprit and thanks you very much. I appreciate your disponibility. I'm just a little bit afraid how to set up the Mytek.

It's just not "plug and play". So, an adaptator is required. Anyway, I had a connector firewire free (disconnect the Impact Twin)

Cheers

[Esprit]

I have the same Mini. Actual Mac have only one 800 (9 pins) and Mytek is 400 (6 pins).

I use the port to connect to the Mytek. If you have this port busy and you want to use FW you need this: Adaptateur Thunderbolt vers FireWire Apple

[mikel]

Thanks Ted_b

 

When you go back to some posts in November / December you will find some good info about this in the thread here.

 

This is my recap:

 

A while back in December, I wanted to know from Mytek why they do not develop direct mode drivers.

There was a pretty hot discussion going on, mostly by email. The Mytek is positioned in the HiFi segment so to me it seemed logical that they should offer a state of the art driver (as other companies do).

 

According to Damien (Audirvana), this should be a rather easy task, a couple of hours of coding work.

 

One problem seems that Mytek would have to outsource that and pay for it. They do not want to do that, being a very small company.

 

Furthermore, they do not believe that implementing a Direct Mode driver would further improve sound quality.

They basically told my that I would have to prove them the benefit in order to potentially implement it.

 

Feedback from other DAC owners with direct support however lead to a different conclusion.

 

To me this really feels that we customers are not taken seriously. For this reason, I am almost sorry I went for the Mytek instead of other very similar products now entering the market.

 

Even the promised that were done in the past are not kept. I was told twice by email that driver updates are coming by the end of December. Well now it's already 4 months later .

 

Now what..... wait another 4 months?

 

If someone asked me today if I would recommend the Mytek my answer is as a DSD player yes..... but overall for the lack of support -> NO!

 

Today I would probably go for the exaSound e20.

 

Mikel

[mikel]

In my about post I refer to Integer Mode not Direct Mode.

That was a mistake.

[Esprit]

Driver update does not concern the integer mode. What are you expecting by the update?

[tipunch]

Me, I listened with the "integer" mode on the USB 1.1.

The sound is really even better.

Ted, I advise you to listen to just once!

So much better than I intend to abandon the FW for the USB1.1, because I do not almost hear differences between 96kHz and 192kHz.

I recommend to Mytek to develop a compatible driver, so this DAC would have really 0 defects and it would be "The Best DAC of the World" and that would boost you sales ;-)

[orgel]

Me, I listened with the "integer" mode on the USB 1.1.

The sound is really even better.

Ted, I advise you to listen to just once!

So much better than I intend to abandon the FW for the USB1.1, because I do not almost hear differences between 96kHz and 192kHz.

I recommend to Mytek to develop a compatible driver, so this DAC would have really 0 defects and it would be "The Best DAC of the World" and that would boost you sales ;-)

 

Another option would be to use a USB->S/PDIF converter that supports integer mode. That way, you aren't limited to 24/96.

 

I'd hasten to say that in my system, the AP2 + PurePower doesn't constitute a night-and-day difference compared with a direct FireWire connection to the Mytek (where I use a good-quality FW cable without a power leg). Now having had the PurePower upgrade for over a month, however, I have to say that it does provide an improvement to my ears -- I find the sound to be less fatiguing and more natural (kind of a squishy analysis, I know), and the real indication that things are better is that I spend much more time completely lost in the music, which is mostly where I want to be.

 

--David

[ted_b]

Me, I listened with the "integer" mode on the USB 1.1.

The sound is really even better.

Ted, I advise you to listen to just once!

So much better than I intend to abandon the FW for the USB1.1, because I do not almost hear differences between 96kHz and 192kHz.

I recommend to Mytek to develop a compatible driver, so this DAC would have really 0 defects and it would be "The Best DAC of the World" and that would boost you sales ;-)

 

Tipunch,

While I appreciate your enthusiasm I HAVE tried it. It is fine, but not even close to the tradeoffs. Let's put it another way: USB1 does not do DSD. USB1 does not do 24/176.4k, nor 24/192k. If the Mytek did not do these things (esp DSD) I would never have even evaluated it. There are hosts of DACs that do 24/96 integer that would come into play.

[mikel]

Driver update does not concern the integer mode. What are you expecting by the update?

Indeed it does not.

I give you three reasons why I consider a driver update valuable:

- the list of corrected issues / improvements since version 3.56 seems quite long to me

- can you be sure that you are not affected by one of these issues?

- other companies (like Weiss) offer driver updates for the same chip, for a good reason

 

In my opinion, the lack of integer support for USB2/FW and denying that there is an advantage in implementing such support is bad enough. But the lack of updated drivers just confirms to me that Mytek is taking their HiFi positioning of the product not really seriously. If you want to be in the HiFi business, you have to walk the whole mile and listen to customers (and not asking them to prove that Integer improves SQ).

[Esprit]

In pro market you are not looking for the last version of the driver.

[mikel]

In pro market you are not looking for the last version of the driver.

 

If you read my last post carefully, you would have seen that I am not talking about the pro market.

 

But your statement is correct.

[Esprit]

The Mytek does not appear "hifi": it is an ugly duckling.

[petecare]

Hi,

Thanks Esprit for the link (adaptator fw>thunderbolt, Mytek comes today by UPS...)

 

Why Integer mode is capable with USB 1 and not USB2 & firewire ??

 

Besides, the drivers update whether it is for pros either for hi-fi, makes no difference, because the uppgrade take advantage in both worlds.

[Esprit]

USB1 does not need driver.

[Burglar]

Hey. I am strongly considering to get the Mytek and was lurking here for a long time.

Yesterday a thread of another forum got to my attention and I wonder if the tested gear was defect or not since their conclusion seems to be quite the opposite what I was reading elsewhere.

Here is the link h**p://www.changstar.com/index.php/topic,883.0.html

[firedog]

Well, I think I've read every review published online, and none were like that one. Maybe he had a brand new unit and didn't let it break in.

[ted_b]

Hey. I am strongly considering to get the Mytek and was lurking here for a long time.

Yesterday a thread of another forum got to my attention and I wonder if the tested gear was defect or not since their conclusion seems to be quite the opposite what I was reading elsewhere.

Here is the link h**p://www.changstar.com/index.php/topic,883.0.html

 

That group was using it incorrectly IMHO. The were unaware it has a VERY hot 5.3VRMS RCA output and it was likely clipping the preamp. Even a dead cold brand new Mytek is not unlistenable (just nothing near its nice sound after 400 hours), as they described...otherwise hundreds of us here have tin ears. I've heard many of the other DACs in that "shoot-out" (I hate that term) and it is nowhere near that comparison. But that is indeed one data point you need to use. Please don't draw a graph with one data point.

[Burglar]

Thanks for the replies.

For me it was also the first read review which is that negative.

I think I will get mine within the next month. I even have 30 day money back guarantee.

The only thing is I have nothing to compare it to against besides my Asus Xonar STX

[sjoc2000]

Hello Firedog;

 

Concerning Myteks and preamps, was wondering if you may have time to respond to;

 

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f8-general-forum/goldpoint-stepped-volume-attenuator-15545/

 

:0)

 

Jim

[ted_b]

Thanks for the replies.

For me it was also the first read review which is that negative.

I think I will get mine within the next month. I even have 30 day money back guarantee.

The only thing is I have nothing to compare it to against besides my Asus Xonar STX

 

Will you use a preamp in between Mytek and amp, or use Mytek's remote volume (analog)? I am a big proponent of using an active preamp, which requires careful setting of the Mytek (it's pro pedigree shows loudly in its very hot outputs, which Mytek has attempted to alleviate with -6db output jumpers in later versions than the original 2011). My Concert Fidelity is a world class preamp but accepts only 2VRMS so the jumpers need to be in (-6db) then about a -2 on the dial to be absolutely a stickler on numbers...although bypass and jumpers works well enough. It is not an issue currently as I use the 3 Myteks in a 5.1 surround stack so the Concert Fidelity is not involved except for ht bypass, which comes at the proper level from my multichannel preamp.

[Burglar]

Will you use a preamp in between Mytek and amp, or use Mytek's remote volume (analog)? I am a big proponent of using an active preamp, which requires careful setting of the Mytek (it's pro pedigree shows loudly in its very hot outputs, which Mytek has attempted to alleviate with -6db output jumpers in later versions than the original 2011). My Concert Fidelity is a world class preamp but accepts only 2VRMS so the jumpers need to be in (-6db) then about a -2 on the dial to be absolutely a stickler on numbers...although bypass and jumpers works well enough. It is not an issue currently as I use the 3 Myteks in a 5.1 surround stack so the Concert Fidelity is not involved except for ht bypass, which comes at the proper level from my multichannel preamp.

No at least not now.

In the moment just want a replacement for my soundcard. And I also need a headphone amp also.

I got my Audeze LCD3 two months ago and they sounded so much better in the shop where I got them (on a Vicolectric V800 and Violectric HPA V200 head amp).

So the Mytek will serve both. I know that I might need a dedicated head amp later on.

 

Edit: Yeah I remeber that I read a thread where someone took 3 Myteks in a row! So that was you Nice setup!!

[john925]

Does anybody use tascam RV-DA1000HD to output DSD through SDIF-3 to Master version? Heard from review33 that this combination with Big Ben Clock win dCS Verdi/Purcell/ElgarPlus

 

And Tascam DA-3000 is going to hit the market, too.

 

Tascam announces DA-3000 high-res recorder

[Miska]

And Tascam DA-3000 is going to hit the market, too.

 

I'm eagerly waiting for that Tascam to appear in Europe. Korg MR-2000S has been really hard to obtain...