Tír Na HiFi

jkeny wrote:Nige has evaluated the latest Audirvana+ Vs Jplay here viewtopic.php?p=38957#p38957

was listening to audivarna earlier as they had an update but their no where near the quality of jplay

please don't leave the evaluations up to me, only in the audio game a few months
i didnt do a whole lot of listening on it either, couple of tracks, audivarna sounds good but when you switch back to jplay you realize audivarna just is not at the same level

but would suggest everyone on mac trial jplay, to me there's a big difference in soundstage

also think the windows to go usb stick is adding more quality over interal ssd what do you think john?

Just ran a quick comparison this morning while the kids were out. Initial impression using Shelby Lynne "Just A Little Lovin'" CD rip to FLAC (a track we all love..).

Ciunas with Audirvana Plus in Integer mode 1 compared with JKDAC (no direct or integer mode). These are my notes:

Much less noise with the Ciunas (noise is something I have become aware of on all recordings since I got the Be tweeters).
Huge amount of air around each performer with the Ciunas. The guitar sounds much more analog. Bass is more recessed and much less in your face. The reverb trail on the vocal is much clearer and vocal seems to float in space. Soundstage is less congested with Ciunas creating much wider picture. Swopping directly over to JKDAC the presentation is more congested tinny and feels louder.

These are just some quick observations on one track. I will have more time tomorrow to get on to some other tracks.
Cheers,
Claus

Thanks for your initial impressions, Claus.
Glad you are liking it.
Look forward to your next installment :)

Swopping directly over to JKDAC the presentation is more congested tinny and feels louder.

Claus[/quote]

Amazing Claus who would have thought we would ever make a comment like that about the jkdac32. Now I know you don't mean it has suddenly turned into a bad product but it is impressive that John has created such a sizeable improvement in the new dac within the same footprint/chassis.

For the sake of clarity I should note that my JKDAC is the earlier version before the JKDAC32. So it has the Sabre Dac AFAIK.... ?
But the improvement is pretty much night&day. But wether it also has to do with me now being able to run Integer mode in Audirvana Plus, I can't say. Suffice to say that I am now very intrigued as to how big an improvement Jplay will give, because I am worried my B.A.T. CD player might be left in the dust... :)

Claus wrote:For the sake of clarity I should note that my JKDAC is the earlier version before the JKDAC32. So it has the Sabre Dac AFAIK.... ?
But the improvement is pretty much night&day. But wether it also has to do with me now being able to run Integer mode in Audirvana Plus, I can't say. Suffice to say that I am now very intrigued as to how big an improvement Jplay will give, because I am worried my B.A.T. CD player might be left in the dust... :)

Yes, Claus, you have the ESS Sabre DAc version which was bettered by the JKDAC32.
If you want to check whether the improvement comes from integer mode or the Ciúnas DAC, just turn off integer mode & compare!

I had a chance to do some more comparisons this afternoon. The results remained consistent with my first observations but after some testing it became obvious that Direct mode and Integer Mode 1 also had a significant impact on sound.

Wilco "Handshake Drugs" was leaner sounding with the Ciunas and made the egg shaker more obvious. The vocal had more air around it but only reached the same magic feel when Int/Direct mode was switched on. Soundstage was also slightly improved with the Ciunas and separation improved. Backing vocals low in the mix were better defined with the Ciunas.

Hires 24/88 of "So What" by Miles Davis improved the shimmer of the cymbals and especially the first saxophone solo sounded more natural and full with the Ciunas in Direct/Integer mode.

Vivaldi's "Spring" from the Fabio Bondi recording sounded vigorous and maybe a bit bright with the JKDAC. Moving on to the Ciunas I noticed a more laid back presentation with more calmness in the soundstage. The Ciunas will not add "body" to the recording so the brightness was more noticeable. The solo violins sounded more wooden and the dynamics during the "storm" gave the whole piece a good sense of drama. This was again amplified when switching to direct/integer mode but maybe not as much as with vocal recordings.

With the Ciunas I was again shocked to hear things I had never heard before! On a CD rip of Danish folk singer called Allan Olsen I could hear his voice picked up and doubled by the guitar mic. Also reverb trails on vocals that had not been noticeable before. He has an uilleann pipe solo on one track where I heard clear fingering over holes for vibrato and bends that I had not heard before.

My conclusion is that the Ciunas is more refined and is able to recreate the recorded material more naturally. It is also leaner sounding with a dryer less bloated bass. In integer/direct mode from Audirvana Plus it gives a magic to certain recordings where vocals seem free floating in the room in a way I have not heard before in my system. Neil Young's hires version of "Harvest" is a revelation! Next will be some June Tabor, Kate Bush and Lucinda to see how they all sound. This is a great product and I am confident that it will prove a worthwhile upgrade for anyone using the JKDAC. I felt that with Direct/Integer mode the Ciunas edged my CD player in terms of sound quality. I would now love to hear it with jplay to see how much better this can get...

Thanks to John for lending me this DAC and giving me a chance to hear what computer audio can achieve. I must say that the potential is great from what I have heard with my simple setup and I will probably go for the NUC from minipc.de one of these days.

Hey John,
Any update on the new DAC availability ... I have my first computer based system ready to go, just a DAC required?!

Plainview wrote:Hey John,
Any update on the new DAC availability ... I have my first computer based system ready to go, just a DAC required?!

I'm working on it - the website should be updated this weekend & ordering will be available then.

Hi all,



I've been really enjoying my demo of Johns' Ciúnas DAC over the last couple of weeks. The install was pretty easy - I just installed the drivers and every time the DAC was picked up by the OS no problem. I haven't posted up to now as there had been a lot of changes on my audio PC of late - all the various versions of jplay and more experimenting besides. But at this stage I really think I have a good handle on the sound of the Ciúnas. Other playback equipment is my shigaclone CD transport and EUVL ESS 9022 DAC.

I had the Ciúnas set up alongside my jkDAC32 - 2 pretty much identical (but not exactly the same) usb cables from the PC to the dacs and identical nordost solar wind interconnects back to the preamp. I am aware that different usb cables can have an effect - but I did also swap both of these back and forth with no observed changes.

I have been a long term fan of the jkDAC32 - and really didn't think it could be improved on. But somehow John has managed to do just that. With the Ciúnas I got a deeper soundstage and a seeming increase in resolution. Particularly with wood instruments, the thing I first noticed was more "timbre" - the instruments sounded "woodier" if that is a word! Now I have to qualify all this by saying that I don't think the difference from the jkDAC32 is massive - but it is definitely there, and an incremental improvement over it. Given how good the jkDAC32 sounded, I do think this is quite the achievement!

Like the jkDAC32, the Ciúnas runs from batteries. The longest I had the dac on straight with no power connection was about 7 hours or so - and the the dac showed no signs of stopping. One of things I do like about both dacs is that they are simple to use. Just install the drivers, turn on the dac and right away the OS picks it up and is ready to play. Its just easy. I just wish the networking and playback SW was as easy!!

I not looking forward to the Ciúnas leaving here - well done to John for managing to improve on an already great dac!


Fran