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HOLO Audio MAY DAC


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I'm not entirely sure how the may's USB is done in terms of what powers what, but I can say that its the only dac i've got where I cannot hear a difference between using direct to PC vs my SMS200 Ultra.

Even the chord dave (which has galvanic isolation on the power lines) did show a slight difference.

Seems the may's USB is exceptionally well done, but as Diavolo said, ymmv. Play about a bit and see what you feel works best for your setup

https://youtube.com/goldensound

Roon -> HQPlayer -> SMS200 Ultra/SPS500 -> Holo Audio May (Wildism Edition) -> Holo Audio Serene (Wildism Edition) -> Benchmark AHB2 -> Hifiman Susvara

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On 1/13/2021 at 2:25 PM, barrows said:

I understand, as you are primarily concerned with OS to PCM, which is less demanding.  My needs are for OS everything to DSD 256 with the EC modulators.  I chose a i9-9900K for this, with its higher base clock rate, and because with the advent of the 10 series the prices came down on the 9900K.  I am not concerned about having a silent machine, so no need for passive cooling for me, I have a fan based cooling system on my new machine build as the server is another part of the home and I use a Sonore Signature Rendu SEoptical as NAA.

My Bricasti M3 loves DSD 256 input.

Just an update,  you are correct.  Attempting DSD1024 or DSD512 with Asdm7ec filter is not stable with regular drop outs.  I am able to get my cpu to operate 10 cores at 3.8ghz constantly and allowed it every power and performance option I could, but it's just too difficult. DSD256 is also not without occasional drops as only 2 CPU cores tackle the modulator and occasionally hit 99%.  Two other cores deal with the filters. So six cores are basically doing very little and unless Jussi can extend the modulator to use more cores I'm limited to Asdm7 and Polysincext2 at DSD128-256.  I have seen him post there's limitations to doing that.  Again though, I mainly listen in NOS mode entirely with Roon passing NOS bit perfect through the May's ASIO driver directly or through Roon to HQP at PCM 1.536MHZ mostly depending on my mood, but I wouldn't mind hearing the hardest setting DSD to see if it's better. 

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39 minutes ago, Lightwave said:

Got my Holo Audio May DAC yesterday. It’s getting more than 16 hours of burn-in time so far. 

 

Should I let it burn-in continuously for the recommended 500 hours or switch it off from time to time? The May runs hotter than I expected so I’m a bit nervous if it should be burned in continuously.

 

 

 

 

Sounds great right out of the box and I didn't notice much of a change honestly, but I leave mine on 24/7.   The heat is mostly just the plethora of resistors in the ladder dacs generating heat which is what resisters are supposed to do.  Leave it on, you won't hurt anything, imho. Congratulations 🎊 on getting your May, have fun! 

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1 hour ago, Lightwave said:

Got my Holo Audio May DAC yesterday. It’s getting more than 16 hours of burn-in time so far. 

 

Should I let it burn-in continuously for the recommended 500 hours or switch it off from time to time? The May runs hotter than I expected so I’m a bit nervous if it should be burned in continuously.

 

 

 

 

Not sure about burnin, but there is definitely a change in sound warm vs cold. Would strongly recommend not turning it off unless you have to. 

 

This goes for other r2r dacs, rockna, denafrips etc. The schiit yggy is infamous for its warmup time. 

 

 

https://youtube.com/goldensound

Roon -> HQPlayer -> SMS200 Ultra/SPS500 -> Holo Audio May (Wildism Edition) -> Holo Audio Serene (Wildism Edition) -> Benchmark AHB2 -> Hifiman Susvara

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I did power off, because I took the break in process in overdrive (having no patience), playing max-loudness techno and pink noise 24/7. At one time, after 4 days, sound really degraded. After taking a pause and continuing the burn in process with normal music, things settled nicely. I'm quite sure my experience was incidental, because nobody reported something similar. Just do not do what I did and try to force the break-in process. 

 

Now I never power down the May. Not even stand by. 

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31 minutes ago, Flextreme said:

Just discovered this amazing review by Goldenone, not shure why he did not share here, but I will anyhow:

 

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/an-exploration-of-chord-dave-mscaler-qutest-and-holo-may-hqplayer.952934/

I'm not going to lie, I just used the find button and searched for "May" 😁 

That description of the May's sound is pure poetry and very aptly written. 👍 🌟 👌 😊 

 

Thanks for sharing! 

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1 hour ago, Lightwave said:

I have this burn-in track from HDTrack that just goes from 20Hz to 20kHz.  I play it in an infinite loop. I used that to burn-in my speakers. Now, I'm wondering if that's NOT the best way to burn-in a DAC.  What do you guys play to burn in the May? 

I just play really good and varied music. I enjoy the ride. 

 

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=1EoZ5oQwIxReGqARxl-p6gFZdTibaDCEp

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6 hours ago, Flextreme said:

Just discovered this amazing review by Goldenone, not shure why he did not share here, but I will anyhow:

 

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/an-exploration-of-chord-dave-mscaler-qutest-and-holo-may-hqplayer.952934/

Yes, that is a great, well-written review/comparison.  I also want to thank you for turning me onto it because in the thread is a link to the equally nice review by Herb Reichert.  I feel I need to contact him, cuz we live similar audio lives (Holo Spring, RAAL Requisite, HQplayer, Todd Garfinkle friend, etc etc). 

 

I am going to redouble my efforts to get a May in here.    😎

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3 hours ago, Diavolo said:

I just play really good and varied music. I enjoy the ride. 

 

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=1EoZ5oQwIxReGqARxl-p6gFZdTibaDCEp

Thanks Diavolo, I’ll switch over to variety of music for my overnight burn in.

 

I am definitely in love with this DAC. PRaT is very good and natural. Bass is round, weighty without sounding too warm. Vocal is textured. Some recordings now sound too grainy but vocals in good recording sound amazing, smooth and with this wetness in the air. 
 

I am only using Audirvana on my old MacBook Pro to play TIDAL. MQA tracks sound grainy after Audirvana’s first unfold. Non-MQA track sounds smoother. 

 

 

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Just wanted to post re: the drivers issue

Looks like kitsune has updated their driver/firmware download page now: https://www.kitsunehifi.com/product/holo-audio-may-dac/#tab-downloads-links

Driver v5.0 is out, and also its got the 3012/3014 firmwares in there. It confirms that the same firmware is used for spring 2 and may which is good.

Also, for @Flextreme it says in the .txt file in the driver folder that apparently 3014 has been the "stock" driver since late 2020, but that they recommend you upgrade to 3012 if your USB chipset is compatible. So that explains why you couldn't use 1.536mhz stock.

https://youtube.com/goldensound

Roon -> HQPlayer -> SMS200 Ultra/SPS500 -> Holo Audio May (Wildism Edition) -> Holo Audio Serene (Wildism Edition) -> Benchmark AHB2 -> Hifiman Susvara

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9 hours ago, Diavolo said:

Suonalo a maggio se ne  hai l'opportunità. È piuttosto sorprendente. 🎶 🎸 

 

PS: Ho avuto più tempo per leggere la tua recensione di headfi, è molto istruttiva e ben scritta. 👍 🌟 👌 

 

 

 

I didn't know this young musician ...👏👏
his "style" is very close to that of Antonio Forcione

sistema:

Server HDPlex (i7-6700-WS2016) HQPlayer con Ramdisk + HQPDcontrol > Macmini (roon core+Qobuz) o HQPlayer Client + Qobuz > HDPlex NAA (celeron G1840T-WS2016) NAD con Ramdisk, o miniPC Fitlet con immagine di Miska > Denafrips Ares2 , SPLvolume2 > Monitor KH+sub

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7 hours ago, GoldenOne said:

Just wanted to post re: the drivers issue

Looks like kitsune has updated their driver/firmware download page now: https://www.kitsunehifi.com/product/holo-audio-may-dac/#tab-downloads-links

Driver v5.0 is out, and also its got the 3012/3014 firmwares in there. It confirms that the same firmware is used for spring 2 and may which is good.

Also, for @Flextreme it says in the .txt file in the driver folder that apparently 3014 has been the "stock" driver since late 2020, but that they recommend you upgrade to 3012 if your USB chipset is compatible. So that explains why you couldn't use 1.536mhz stock.

 

Yeah they cleared up the text on the homepage and in the driver: good. It was very confusing. Tim explained that 3012 mostly works on Intel, I figured my USB (AMD) would be the bottleneck. THe may is not the only device struggling: had similar issues with my HP reverb g2 vr set. 

 

I will retry, but I am not in a hurry, it is difficult to fault the May with the 3014, it is amazing. 

 

Do you actually notice an audible difference with 1.536mhz in comparison to 768khz with HQplayer?

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8 hours ago, Lightwave said:

Thanks Diavolo, I’ll switch over to variety of music for my overnight burn in.

 

I am definitely in love with this DAC. PRaT is very good and natural. Bass is round, weighty without sounding too warm. Vocal is textured. Some recordings now sound too grainy but vocals in good recording sound amazing, smooth and with this wetness in the air. 
 

I am only using Audirvana on my old MacBook Pro to play TIDAL. MQA tracks sound grainy after Audirvana’s first unfold. Non-MQA track sounds smoother. 

 

 

I'm not a fan of MQA for technical reasons related it to it not being a lossless codec, however I do allow Roon to do the first unfold and I'm not noticing any grain with my setup, but I'll turn off the MQA decoder and go straight NOS to see if I prefer the sound more. It should be as good as 16/44 redbook all things being equal.  

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1 hour ago, Diavolo said:

I'm not a fan of MQA for technical reasons related it to it not being a lossless codec, however I do allow Roon to do the first unfold and I'm not noticing any grain with my setup, but I'll turn off the MQA decoder and go straight NOS to see if I prefer the sound more. It should be as good as 16/44 redbook all things being equal.  


My understanding is that the 16/44 before any unfold is not the same as the 16/44 you get from red book due to compression. Not saying that I can hear the difference in the lossy compression. 😅

 

I don’t have access to qobuz in Canada. What I read online is that the same track in TIDAL usually sounds thinner when compared to Qobuz. When I compare my flac files purchased from ProStudoMaster.com, TIDAL sounds thinner. That’s my subjective impression and I don’t have a large library to compare with more variety of tracks in TIDAL.

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9 hours ago, GoldenOne said:

Just wanted to post re: the drivers issue

Looks like kitsune has updated their driver/firmware download page now: https://www.kitsunehifi.com/product/holo-audio-may-dac/#tab-downloads-links

Driver v5.0 is out, and also its got the 3012/3014 firmwares in there. It confirms that the same firmware is used for spring 2 and may which is good.

Also, for @Flextreme it says in the .txt file in the driver folder that apparently 3014 has been the "stock" driver since late 2020, but that they recommend you upgrade to 3012 if your USB chipset is compatible. So that explains why you couldn't use 1.536mhz stock.

@GoldenOne do you know if firmware 3012 is compatible with old MacBook? Other than support for 1.536MHz, does the lower sampling rates sound better with 3012 firmware?

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@GoldenOne, thank you for the detailed explanation on MQA. I appreciate you taking the time to shed some light on this confusing and seemingly protected MQA practice. It confirms what I heard. Perhaps MQA stands for Mob Quatrol Assurance. 😆

 

Now if anyone knows how Canadian can sign up for Qobuz, please help a brother out.

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