Emotiva XDA-1

I felt like the skinny kid on the beach in the Charles Atlas comic book ads from the last mid century.
“OK, I’ll take the gamble, Jimmy Neutron says it can add real body and debt to my FiHi system”.

When bought my Squeezebox 3 I thought this sound damn good. My only other DAC (well some other DAC’s I bought from Big Lots but lets not go there) was a HRT Music Streamer II, which I thought was only slightly better then the SB3. To be fair I love the Internet radio from the SB3 and I was running the HRT Music Streamer II out of a Vortex box so my views were not very objective; “Love the one you’re with.” I only say this because there is a cadre of Akers who love the HRT. It is a good DAC to be sure.

So I am thinking I’m not going to find a big improvement for $199 maybe a Benchmark for approx 1K on ebay maybe? Or that Berkley DAC, while I love the city…if only I was born rich instead of so damn good looking (I wish!)
So my review of the Emotiva; right out of the box.

First there was lot of rich low end. I’m on my computer listening to my B and W 805 Matrix, which go low for their size but that low-end warmth is always appreciated even if it is just a few dB of low end and If not just for the harmonics. I love harmony and minor piano and guitar cords.


Second I love a sense of separation, I guess it is called soundstage where you can follow a line of music, or the background singers or the main singer’s struggle or expression. I love to figure out or guess who is singing background.

On one Steely Dan song you can really make out Donald Fagen slight lisp. Of course he is gay but I say this as a complement, Character lines or sounds are what makes us human and give a sense of pathos. Maria Callas doesn’t have a pretty or great voice especially when she sings Bel Canto but it is the pathos. “ I’m stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis blues again”

Thirds ..well I am looking up some Stereofile adjectives right now

OK Jimmy Neutron thank you,

Michael
 
Where in the chain?

OK, Saturday I awoke to reading the three most beautiful words in the English language "Out for Delivery" (Fedex Saturday delivery is wonderful!).
So, since then, I've been using my XDA-1 as a preamp (love the volume control from the remote) with a WD TV Live and a Roku streamer as sources, with the output connected to a Magnavox 8802.
Now the problem, how do I integrate a turntable into the system, while trying to keep the signal path as simple as I can. I was using the preamp section of a Kyocera R-461 as a preamp for everything, but I'm thinking that simply running the output of the XDA-1 into the Aux input of the Kyocera is a possible source of noise/distortion, maybe audible, maybe not, but still, it's gotta have an effect on the quality of sound.
So, how do you all have your XDA-1 connected in your systems, and do you have a turntable in use as well?

Thanks for any guidance you can offer.
 
"how do I integrate a turntable into the system, while trying to keep the signal path as simple as I can" Well the XDA-1 only has digital inputs, optical coaxial and USB so to add a turntable you would need to covert analog(phono) to digital to input to the XDA-1 where it would be converted to analog again. Not the best thing to do. I guess that as a pre-amp the XDA-1 is really only suited for digital sources. I don't think the Kyocera introduces enough noise to worry too much about so if it was me I'd leave it as is or get a better pre-amp.
 
The XDA-1 is a digital only DAC - not for analog. You will have to add too many A/D and D/A converters in the chain to kep it simple. Remember, the XDA-1 was/is not intended to replace ANY preamp you may already have, but instead to be used as a full-on DAC first, then as a simple direct digital source selector (simple digital preamp) second.

While there are ways to do it, adding an analog turntable to the XDA-1 defeats the purpose. Remember: Digital to digital, analog to analog.

Jimmy
 
Thanks for weighing in guys. The XDA-1 does such a good job of pretending to be a full featured preamp, I was looking for a short cut/method that would allow me to eliminate my preamp altogether. Guess you can't get there from here so to speak. I'll have to give some thought to how badly I want to play vinyl as it would be nice to go straight from the XDA into my Maggie tube amps. 90+% of my listening these days is either MOG or my mp3/flac library via either a Roku or WD streamer.
 
I have one of these arriving this week, the $199 was very tempting.

My mini mac has a bug where the HDMI cable adds noise to my headphone jack, a noticeable aggravating static that is then transferred to my receiver. Found a few obscure references to it online trying to trouble shoot it and sure enough as soon as the HDMI is unplugged the noise disappears. But then so does my monitor :D

Anyhoo, this Emotiva using USB is supposed to completely bypass my mac sound card and send the pure data transfer to the Emotiva (as I understand it) so I think this should eliminate my problem. Will come back with an update later this week.
 
I have one of these arriving this week, the $199 was very tempting.

My mini mac has a bug where the HDMI cable adds noise to my headphone jack, a noticeable aggravating static that is then transferred to my receiver. Found a few obscure references to it online trying to trouble shoot it and sure enough as soon as the HDMI is unplugged the noise disappears. But then so does my monitor :D

Anyhoo, this Emotiva using USB is supposed to completely bypass my mac sound card and send the pure data transfer to the Emotiva (as I understand it) so I think this should eliminate my problem. Will come back with an update later this week.

You don't need to use the USB connection really to bypass the sound card in the Mini.
The Headphone jack is a dual output jack that will pass analog audio with the noise using the Mini sound card as you are already aware of or by using an Optical Digital cable with a Mini Jack on one end it will send a Digital signal to the DAC directly bypassing the Mini sound card.

Actually I think it will be more capable in your case trying it this way as opposed to the USB connection.

The nice thing is that it is easy enough to try both and see which yo like best.

Either way it is a lot of DAC for the money.

Ed
 
Purchased one locally off the bay - will be here tomorrow - I'll report what I think of it ....
 
or by using an Optical Digital cable with a Mini Jack on one end it will send a Digital signal to the DAC directly bypassing the Mini sound card.

Actually I think it will be more capable in your case trying it this way as opposed to the USB connection.

Ahh, very interesting, thank you ! I'd rather go that route if just to free up the usb port. So I can buy a cable with optical digital on one end and mini-jack on the other ? And my mini will know to bypass the soundcard when this is plugged in ?

In the voice of Mr. Burns, "Excellent" :)
 
Ahh, very interesting, thank you ! I'd rather go that route if just to free up the usb port. So I can buy a cable with optical digital on one end and mini-jack on the other ? And my mini will know to bypass the soundcard when this is plugged in ?

In the voice of Mr. Burns, "Excellent" :)

No such item exists (that I know of). Optical cables came in standard toslink size and minijack size, which is the same size as a headphone plug. But its got an optical end in it.

If the jack is a minijack-optical plug, you can get adapters. If its coaxial spdif output, you have to buy a box to convert the electrical signal in to an optical. It *can* be as easy as getting a toslnk jack and using something to drive it based on the electrical spdif signal.

Sent from my Transformer TF101 using Tapatalk 2
 
I wasn't able to get a clear pic, but there is a second mini jack right next to the headphone jack. The symbol above it looks like a monitor ? Sorry, my eyes arent the best. I also have firewire, and one more input that looks like some sort of rectangular usb.
 
P.S., this is what the back of my mini looks like. Anything look like a mini optical ?

p.s., p.s, just got this from my specs "combined "audio line in (digital/analog)" and combined "audio line out/headphone (digital/analog)" minijacks,"

1311907948-apples-core-i5-powered-newest-version-of-mac-mini-mc815lla-desktop-pc-3.jpg
 
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Thanks for the info everyone, I think I'm set up for optical. I'll use the USB connection until I order a digital cable.
 
There is 1 mini jack for in and another for out.
There are certainly adapters you stick right on the end of a normal Toslink cable that converts that end to go into a mini jack,should be a simple item to find?
I think I have found them at RS and Best Buy and for sure at Micro Center. They are also less than cheap.

http://www.monoprice.com/products/p...=10423&cs_id=1042301&p_id=2671&seq=1&format=2

If you have to.

You can also just get a cable with one of each end and in fact Apple sells one too.

http://www.monoprice.com/products/p...=10229&cs_id=1022902&p_id=1556&seq=1&format=2

The Mini will usually see the cable and just switch to optical but if not just go to system preferences and select digital out manually.

Ed
 
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Using the Apple's headphone/spdif output jack still goes thru the Mac Mini's soundcard (directly actually). You will still have all files upsampled, or downsampled, to the frequency and rate that the card runs on, and then gets sampled again to the native rate of the file. In other words, if the built in soundcard processes all audio at a rate of 48kHz, then all your 44.1, 96, and 192 kHz files will get sampled to those rates first, then pass thru the card, then get sampled at the output once more at their native rate. This double conversion is what you want to avoid. Your best bet is to use the USB output and go into the DAC directly. The Mac has a very nice USB bus that won't screw with the audio timings like a Windows PC.

JN
 
LOL!!! No, I may be wrong. I know that on a Windows machine you want to avoid using the soundcard as it will process all files at it's rate. I'm not sure if the Mac's do it also. I can only assume since their architecture is similar that it may also process at a fixed rate before re-sampling it again at the native rate and passing it along to the output. Besides, USB is a much cleaner way to send digital music files anyway (all things considered).

JN
 
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