I ran a listening and light measuring bakeoff for the DAC spot in the Nest Desk system. I recently revamped all the electronics on the Nest Desk; I sold the NAD D3045 amp/receiver and Woo Audio WA7/7TP headphone DAC/Amp. The new amp is the keen Black Ice FX10H rolled up with a matched quad of Tung-Sol 7189s, but I've yet to finalize on the DAC. The speakers are my Blanda108NSs, and the headphones are primarily the Audeze LCD-2s.
The DACs... compared here are "entry level audiophile" models from some of my favored vendors. There is a real cost to making this comparison as there are restocking charges I have to pay, as well as return shipping, for "the losers." Those costs won't factor into my decision however.
| Vendor | Black Ice | Schiit | Denafrips |
| Model | Glass FX Tube DAC_DSD WiFi | Bifrost 2/64 | Enyo 15th |
| Price | $900 | $800 | $700 |
| DAC | Delta-Sigma | "True Multibit" | R2R Discrete Ladder Multibit |
| DSD | Yes (DSD64) | No | Yes (DSD 1024) |
| PCM Rez | 32bit/192KHz | 24bit/192KHz | 24bit/192KHz |
| BT/WiFi | Yes | No | No |
| Balanced Out | No | Yes | Yes |
| Headphone Amp | Yes (12AX7) | No | No |
Features & Formats... Comparing features is a bit odd as the Black Ice includes a nice 12AX7 tube amp for driving headphones and the others do not. Alone that "DAC" is like my Fireflies headphone set. Frankly though I don't need this as the Black Ice FX10H amp itself includes good unbalanced headphone out. It'll require just a little more juice to drive. The Black Ice DAC is an exact fit on the stack, which is nice, but also not a determinant for the Nest Desk DAC choice.
Further on features, while both the Black Ice and Denafrips support DSD decoding, I rarely use that, but I do have some files ripped from SACD. Only the Black Ice has WiFi/AirPlay support, which is high rez and cool, but I don't expect I'll use that much either. The overwhelming factor driving the comparison for me here is critical listening. I have favored multibit DAC designs previously when comparing, but let's see how it unfolds at this price point.
Listening Comparison Setup... The most effective listening comparison scheme I've discovered is to use favored or challenging music pieces and to quickly switch among the devices under test and replay the pieces or key parts of them... I keep delays between comparative replays very brief. I use headphones to compare DACs. Sometimes this setup is a challenge to achieve and while I recognize using different digital inputs (USB, fiber, COAX) might not allow a pure A-B comparison, the differences in analogue sound produced by a DAC will be completely dominated by their DAC design, not their input circuit differences. Here we are listening to the differences between a classic delta-sigma decoder in the Black Ice, a classic discrete resistor ladder decoder in the Denafrips, and an unusual design called "True Multibit" in the Schiit; it uses 4 medical grade DAC chips to render high rez and high timing accuracy D>A conversions. So, to me, the only real R2R multibit DAC in the field is the Enyo.
The Schiit & Denafrips Arrived... so let the games begin. I am first pitting the two new "multibit" designs against each other in COS using the reference headphone stack there... Mr Speakers EtherC Flow planar magnetics driven by the Schiit Mjolnir 2... balanced all the way to my ears, sometimes. I lashed both DACs into the mac with USB (and did the A-B switching there). I turned off Sonarworks for testing.
The units are about the same size but the Enyo is deeper (fine as the Black Ice amp is deeper than the Bifrost 2) and much heavier. Build quality is excellent on both. Both units also have balanced and single-ended outputs ~ I'm going to use both for listening and swap occasionally, to be even handed.
I quickly verified that the Denefrips played DSD stuff; yep. I did need to recall how to turn on DSD bitstreaming in JRiver MC32 as initially the .dsf file was being transcoded. Sounded fantastic either way but I have precious little DSD source material.
On with the stuff that really counts.... listening. Wow, it is very close. I played a bunch of stuff over 2 hours and was never fatigued. Tunes included these, and what I listened to most closely in each, for the comparisons:
- Wheatus "London Sun" ~ Rock glory
- Molly Tuttle "Getaway Girl" ~ Bluegrass instrument solos, esp Molly's flatpicking, and her voicing
- Sammy Rae "David" ~ Wide range lady voice dynamics
- Reina del Cid "The Cooling" ~ Midrange voice and orchestra strings
- Norah Jones "Come Away With Me" ~ Piano and lady voice
- Flim & The BBs "Funhouse" ~ Overall dynamics and a 22Hz note
- Vampire Weekend "Oxford Comma" ~ Male voicing and rock mix; pick out the instruments
- The Beths "Expert In A Dying Field" ~ Electric guitar speed
- AJ Lee & Blue Summit "City Of Glass" ~ Mandolin & AJ's voice and breathing
Sound Says It All... Everything on both MB units sounded completely great. There were no USB glitches on either box from my Mac. Both units delivered better when fully hooked up XLR/balanced to the amp... for a great headphone setup, I believe balanced from source material to your ear has the best shot at the finest sound. Unfortunately the scheme I'll roll with in the Nest Desk system, driven from the FX10H, is single ended. In the final analysis I did hear some subtle differences between these entry level audiophile "multibit" DACs.
- Enyo delivered more definition, especially at the low end; I heard it on acoustic bass plucked and played with a bow and I heard it on bass drum thumps. In fact all drum strikes seemed a bit more defined as to their decay dynamics.
- Bifrost 2/64 rang a smidge on some high stringed instruments like fiddle and mandolin. Not a damming ring, just not as round and musical as the Enyo. The Enyo was more fun to hear, to my ear.
- Enyo & Bifrost both did fine at the very high end with cymbal crashes and high notes from piano & organ; I could not really discern differences.
Both of these "multibit" DACs are completely great, and killer values for their prices. It is a tough call but I will be returning the Schiit Bifrost 2/64 today. Then, it's off to Summit for the final bakeoff... The Black Ice DAC is gonna have to really outperform to keep its "Desk" job vs the Enyo I sense.
Final Compare & Decision... Well, the dedicated single ended headphone output on the Black Ice DAC itself is very nice. I tried my iems as well as bigger cans there and it's a very good, very quiet sound. It is single ended too and it's not enough to carry the day IMO... I am ready to use the 1/4" single ended jack on the FX10H and it's "bigger" tube amplification. There are more remarkable differences comparing the Black Ice and the Denafrips in this round than during the multibit bakeoff in COS...
- Black Ice introduces a low freq hum audible as it switches on to decoding, or when pausing the source. It also is noisier. It does fine decoding but the sound is a shade muddled compared to the Denafrips.
- Denafrips displays dead quiet and punches every note and instrument to potential. The extra "definition" in the music from the Enyo that barely edged out the Schiit Bifrost is prevalent again, but crushes the Black Ice in comparison. The Denafrips is just clearly better.
- Both DACs did fine driving the Blanda108NSs. Measuring with REW didn't provide great insights... the SPL curves were different but not distinctively and the spectral analyses showed some modest distortion with each, but at different frequencies.
In the end, the Denafrips (D-ynamic, E-xquisite , N-atural, A-ttractive, F-idelity, R-efined , I-ntoxicating, P-ure, S-ophisticated) Enyo 15th is just audibly better than the other DACs I had in this bakeoff. And, it is the least expensive option. The Black Ice is going back tomorrow. Here's the final Nest Desk kit install...
