Article: Review | DenaFrips Pontus DAC

[AudioDoctor]

6 hours ago, bluesman said:

This thread has gone a bit off topic, and alternative facts have crept in. It's irrelevant to us as audiophiles whether 911 sales are rising or falling, but I hope correcting this silly little error will motivate others to verify what they say before presenting it as fact.  My source is Porsche - sales figures are published in Panorama (the monthly rag of the PCA) and I just double checked them against Porsche NA numbers in industry publications.  FWIW, I've been a PCA member since 1965, so I carry a lot of Porsche info in my head.  The waning demand for 911s is not news to any lifelong Porsche person.

 

911s are definitely not selling like hotcakes.  I don't think we can blame Jeremy Clarkson for it, but "911" sales are not strong at all.  FWIW, I put 911 in quotes because it's a fictional model number that only describes the 1963 original.  Porsche numbered every one of his designs sequentially, regardless of the item.  The car introduced in 1963 was actually design 901, and that was what they intended to call it.  But Peugeot had some kind of international registration on car models with 3 digits and a zero in the middle, so Porsche made it the 911. Each subsequent iteration had a later number, but all of them share the generic moniker "911" because they share the basic physical profile.

 

In the interest of accuracy, here's a North American 911 sales chart:

 

 

 

 

 

Ok, now look at Cayennes...

 

https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/porsche/351899/porsche-sets-sales-record-and-huge-profit-spite-new-dieselgate-fine

 

"Porsche sold 92,055 of the Cayenne, an increase of 29 per cent year-on-year, and 99,944 Macans, an increase of 16 per cent, in 2019. "

[Blake]

Looks like USA-based Denafrips service is now official:

 

Service Centers @ UNITED STATES      Hello friends,   We are pleased to announce that we have appointed Sean Nauman and Macon P. as our service representatives in the United States. Please welcome them on board!    For more information, kindly visit our new SUPPORT page for more details.   https://www.vinshineaudio.com/support   Many thanks.   Yours sincerely, Alvin Chee   Subscribe for Updates Add your email... Subscribe Share Via: Vinshine Audio Singapore

[bluesman]

15 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

Jeremy Clarkson thinking the 911 is a "jumped up beetle" hasn't hurt 911 sales one bit... Cayennes are selling like freaking hotcakes too

 

58 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

Ok, now look at Cayennes...

We weren’t talking about Cayennes.  We can’t even stay on topic off topic.

 

[matthias]

6 minutes ago, bluesman said:

We weren’t talking about Cayennes.  We can’t even stay on topic off topic.

 

No real man buys a Cayenne. Period.

 

Matt

[AudioDoctor]

25 minutes ago, bluesman said:

 

We weren’t talking about Cayennes.  We can’t even stay on topic off topic.

 

 

I would really like to stop the off topic, but if you're going to continue get your facts right.

 

 

[Vhond]

Why 4 out of 5 stars? (maybe I missed it?)

[The Computer Audiophile]

49 minutes ago, Vhond said:

Why 4 out of 5 stars? (maybe I missed it?)

The star rating is given by anyone and it’s supposed to be a rating of the review, not the product. 

[sdolezalek]

On 12/16/2020 at 12:33 PM, matthias said:

 

No real man buys a Cayenne. Period.

 

Matt

My wife might beg to differ.  I've personally progressed from a 911 Carrera4 Targa to a Panamera Turbo S to a Cayenne (it's more practical on the farm) and as much as I loved the 911, it remineded me of a great pair of headphones (light, crisp, incredibly detailed, bass when needed, but tiring after a few hours).  In comparison, the Panamera Turbo (even though Porschefiles hate it) was like sitting in the front row at the symphony or in front of Chris'  Wilson Audio Alexia's at full throttle -- you just couldn't believe almost 5,000 lbs could hold a curving road, or press your skull into the headrests, or hold onto a icy patch that way.  And you could drive it for 12 hours straight and still get out fully relaxed.  That is the one good thing about the Cayenne -- I can fall asleep in it better that either of the other two. ;-)  

 

By comparison to the Panamera, my M5 and M6 and even my Tesla S seemed like blunt instruments -- lots of bass, lots of speed, far less finesse.  Only a Tesla D with Ludricrous mode that I borrowed for a week has come close.  But, most of those differences only became apparent over months and years of owning these cars; if I had just taken them for a 24 hour test drive, I might have reached completely different conclusions.

 

Which actually brings me back to the original subject of this thread:  When I hear people describe the Pontus or any of the other Denafrips DACs or for that matter any R2R DAC I hear a lot of the same things said as when people describe why they still prefer analog -- more air, more reverberance, perhaps even conceding a bit of euphonic distortion...compared to what others describe as the clinical precision of the delta-sigma DACs.  I've found that depending on my filter choices in HQPlayer, I can actually simulate some of those same differences.  But I have also found that when I go for the "analog/R2R sound" I tend to prefer it when I first walk into the room and for an hour or two thereafter (like the 911), but when I want a sound I can live with for hours and days on end, I choose the leaner, more subtle style that makes little impression at first, but an hour or so into a listening session you find that you have become completely lost in the music (the way my Panamera made me feel - but lost in the drive).  

 

Are there long term R2R afficionados who would strenously disagree? 

[Blake]

18 minutes ago, sdolezalek said:

Are there long term R2R afficionados who would strenously disagree? 

 

 

Yes, to the point where I might get a hernia. 

 

[sdolezalek]

2 minutes ago, Blake said:

 

 

Yes, to the point where I might get a hernia. 

 

Ah yes, but if I remember correctly, you've gone all in for the Termintor-Plus and you've been selling off your (overly clinical/detailed, weak on bass) Sennheiser 800/800S collection... ;-) 

[Blake]

@sdolezalek yes, guilty as charged.😁

[Steve_Burl]

George can you comment on the Pontus vs.Bryston 3.14 vs. Lumin X1?

 

Thanks, and great review. I wonder how much better the higher end Denafrips units are?

[gmgraves]

13 hours ago, Steve_Burl said:

George can you comment on the Pontus vs.Bryston 3.14 vs. Lumin X1?

 

Thanks, and great review. I wonder how much better the higher end Denafrips units are?

I wonder the same thing. As to your Q, no I have not heard either the Bryston or the Lumin DAC. I have reviewed one of the Lumin music streamers, but not their DACs.

 

rant/ Frankly (at the risk of rendering an unsolicited opinion), I don’t see the point of a hardware music streamer. They are mostly very expensive, and an older computer running Roon or Audirvana et al, does just as well, to serve-up your streaming services such as Tidal, Quobuz, and Amazon Music, and is, in fact, far more capable. Here’s an example. A couple of summers ago, the BBC decided to stream the annual Proms concerts in FLAC in addition to the normal MP3 compression format. You needed to be able to run a certain release of Firefox web browser on a different BBC feed to be able to parse the FLAC. If you could do that, you had access to live, full bandwidth performances of world-class conductors leading the great BBC Symphony Orchestra, every day, in almost 2 months worth of nightly performances, in real time, from the world-famous Royal Albert Hall in London! No hardware streamer could have done that, regardless of cost. But any laptop, running Windows 7/10, Mac, or Linux could do both easily. I even had an application running simultaneously with the correct version of Firefox, which allowed me to capture to a SSD, every performance. It just seems to me that a computer does the streaming of ripped or subscribed-to music over the Internet just as well as any dedicated hardware box, and does other related tasks (such as capturing a stream to HDD) as well, and can do so for a tiny fraction of the cost of an expensive streamer. And even were the price the same, there’s no way that a streamer could be as versatile or as adaptable to changing situations (such as the aforementioned BBC Proms FLAC streaming events). Of course, as always, YMMV. /rant😉

 

[Steve_Burl]

Thanks!

[micatske]

Wonderful review. I am very interet in Pontus. Curious any one compare it to Holo Spring 2? They seems fail into the same price range

[Allan F]

On 12/16/2020 at 5:00 AM, bluesman said:

FWIW, I put 911 in quotes because it's a fictional model number that only describes the 1963 original.  Porsche numbered every one of his designs sequentially, regardless of the item.  The car introduced in 1963 was actually design 901, and that was what they intended to call it.  But Peugeot had some kind of international registration on car models with 3 digits and a zero in the middle, so Porsche made it the 911.

 

FWIW, IMO it's not worth very much. 😀 A Porsche 911 is a Porsche 911 is a Porsche 911. What a company may designate designs of a particular model internally may be irrelevant to its branding. Porsche has sold and continues to sell the model as a 911 since 1963. The fact that it was originally going to be the "901" is of historical interest, but it doesn't make "911" fictional.

[The Computer Audiophile]

George's article about listening to the physical SACDs through this DAC is up on the front page!

 

 

[thotdoc]

On 12/10/2020 at 8:55 AM, orosie said:

LOL....people can be so fragile these days.

It's not fragile to understand what people are really saying when they communicate. No one cried, no on'e feeling are hurt. Not fragile; just pointing out what he was saying.

 

Do you like sites that devolve into flame wars?

 

 

[Boniccie]

On 12/10/2020 at 9:57 AM, Blake said:

 

Hey Matt,

 

Venus 2 arrived two weeks ago and it is residing in my new "work from home" home office, which includes a super nice audio rack ($35 from Amazon).  I haven't had a chance to compare yet.

 

 

I see you have Denafrips Iris in your audio rack. What are your thoughts on the Iris and are you hearing improvement over just streamer to the Denafrips dac? Thank you! Dan

[sbank]

Pontus pendings are now shipping 😆

[alvin1118]

Thanks! We were busy fulfilling the orders. Hope the Pontus reaches you soon!

[sbank]

@alvin1118 Arrived in Austin, TX yesterday (3 days early). Compliments on the secure packing materials. 

Setup was a breeze. Sounds great right out-of-the-box. That won't stop me from running it 24/7 for another hundred hours or more. 

 

One small suggestion for your buddies at Denafrips: You might consider updating wording on the quick start guide regarding that drivers only apply for computers. I was scratching my head for a moment, wondering if/how I'd install a driver on my opticalRendu, but of course that wasn't needed. Cheers,

Spencer

 

[orosie]

On 1/21/2021 at 8:03 PM, thotdoc said:

It's not fragile to understand what people are really saying when they communicate. No one cried, no on'e feeling are hurt. Not fragile; just pointing out what he was saying.

 

Do you like sites that devolve into flame wars?

 

 

See......fragile.  : )

[davide256]

Finally. Another separate review.

 

https://parttimeaudiophile.com/2021/02/12/denafrips-pontus-ii-dac-review/

[ted_b]

22 minutes ago, davide256 said:

Finally. Another separate review.

 

https://parttimeaudiophile.com/2021/02/12/denafrips-pontus-ii-dac-review/

Unique review perspective.  I wonder if he also test drives a Ferrari in rush hour traffic.  I mean, rush hour may be the typical environment but if you test drive a Ferrari I would find some open country roads to let it out. 

 

I get that he normally uses AES/EBU and SPDIF, but in a public review shouldn't he test the limits for us?   Maybe it's just me.  I'm an upsampling fan and believe that PCM at 1.5Mhz and DSD at very high rates (i.e 1024) should have real benefits sq-wise, especially when upsampled properly.  I'd like to hear this feedback from someone putting a dac through it's paces.  YMMV.