Taiko Audio SGM Extreme : the Crème de la Crème

[Taiko Audio]

I just received this very nice feedback from a customer I'd like to share in a Christmas spirit:


Dear Emile,

I wanted to give you a little gift for Christmas and so I took a very high resolution photograph 55mp and spent some time in Lightroom. Since the Extreme came into my life I have started looking forward everyday to listening to music again.

I am very grateful to you for this gift and want to express my thanks.

I have worked on my system and managed to improve the sound considerably over the past 10 days. I would say it is a 90% improvement from where I was two weeks ago. I have learned a lot during this process. The exciting part is that there is more to come.

One of my closest friends, who has a deeply impressive system came over today, after listening for a while he turned around and said to me this sound is so good it makes me want to sell my speakers and focus on Headphone listening. Now that is a change normally its the other way around!

From my family to yours we wish you all very happy Christmas and I for one look forward in anticipation of what the next year will hold.

If you would like the RAW version of this file please let me know and I can put it on Dropbox for you.

Warmest regards,

S

 

[spiritofmusic]

Well, if there is still a qualitative difference btwn digital and analog, even at the highest level, it's analog mids density, what I term "carved from stone". The buzz on AE is that the Wadax Ref is the first digital to have cracked this barrier. AE listeners incl long standing vinylphiles are reporting no major shortfall in this area listening to music on this dac.

If that's true and not typical AE hyperbole, maybe a paradigm shift is happening.

Then again, the AE guys don't seem to have much experience of Msb Select 2, Dcs Vivaldi, AC Kassandra etc, so claims of a unique breakthru should be taken with a pinch of salt.

 

[howiebrou]

Then again, the AE guys don't seem to have much experience of Msb Select 2, Dcs Vivaldi, AC Kassandra etc, so claims of a unique breakthru should be taken with a pinch of salt.

Mark I'm not sure that's necessarily true with regards to experience. Whilst they do extoll the virtues of AE supplied equipment vigorously and unashamedly many AE aficionados also have a wide breadth of exposure to other brands as far as I can tell.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Sure Howie, and I don't want to go OT here. Feedback on Extreme via Lampi Pacific, TotalDac and MSB Select 2 has been stellar, Wadax Ref may be one of the last big beast dacs to be reported on via Extreme.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Well, if there is still a qualitative difference btwn digital and analog, even at the highest level, it's analog mids density, what I term "carved from stone". The buzz on AE is that the Wadax Ref is the first digital to have cracked this barrier. AE listeners incl long standing vinylphiles are reporting no major shortfall in this area listening to music on this dac.

If that's true and not typical AE hyperbole, maybe a paradigm shift is happening.

no, it's not happening.

 

[spiritofmusic]

So Mike, vinyl is still the immoveable rock? I know my analogy is a little broad, but having heard a lot of great digital rigs in the last few yrs, incl SGM/Aqua Formula XHD, my main abiding take is that fully tonally saturated mids remains the primary area still seperating great analog from the best digital. The AE reports on Wadax Ref seem to be suggesting this divide is being breached. Of course, claim and reality are often at loggerheads in audio.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

So Mike, vinyl is still the immoveable rock? I know my analogy is a little broad, but having heard a lot of great digital rigs in the last few yrs, incl SGM/Aqua Formula XHD, my main abiding take is that fully tonally saturated mids remains the primary area still seperating great analog from the best digital. The AE reports on Wadax Ref seem to be suggesting this divide is being breached. Of course, claim and reality are often at loggerheads in audio.

without getting too far into the weeds with this subject that's been beat to death, at the bleeding edge, vinyl is moving forward as fast or faster than digital. and it has more to work with.

vinyl is simply a touch point for people to attach to listening perceptions. thus it will always be used to make a case for digital break-thru's. the style of AE really pushes this idea. nothing wrong, nothing different, no big deal. some digital will always be as good as some vinyl. yawn. means nothing.

as digital gets better, a case can be made that vinyl is not necessary (the 'good enough' case), and i agree that case is stronger now......but that is a different idea than 'as good as'.

 

[Taiko Audio]

Marc,

There is a fundamental difference, a native analogue recording, analogue mastered and transferred to its medium sounds fundamentally different to a digitally recorded and/or digitally mastered source file. More attention has been paid historically to the former and a decent selection of really prime cuts is available in that format. With digitally sourced files this is more the exception then the rule, but things are moving in the right direction there with an increasing market demand for prime digital cuts.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Mike, in my chosen genres of music (sonically challenging late 60s to late 70s progressive rock, fusion, electric jazz) good vinyl beats really good digital by a country mile. Across a broader range of new music, much more even, and indeed I'd give the nod often to digital. On a broader swathe of music that should suit both analog and digital, it often depends on the mastering. For me, that's a massive step fwd for digital, for this analog stalwart at least

Another way of looking at it, is where digital is second to analog, it's noticeably so, where digital is superior, it's a closer call, more just a subjective preference.

My ears pricked up when I saw the AE feedback an Wadax Ref dac analog-like mids density "breakthru". Surely if a dac was to truly shatter preconceptions, it would be precisely in this area.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Mike, as someone more than the 99.9% who can fully access the very best lps, tapes and digital, your "nothing new to see here sonny, move along now" attitude re AE style hyperbole is always both enlightening and sobering.

I'm intrigued by yr take that advances in analog are more apace than digital. That IS news to me.

Thus a fully mature medium (vinyl), that has been sounding great for decades, STILL has jumps in performance w current gear and new gear being unveiled. Greater than digital.

 

[bonzo75]

Mike, in my chosen genres of music (sonically challenging late 60s to late 70s progressive rock, fusion, electric jazz) good vinyl beats really good digital by a country mile. Across a broader range of new music, much more even, and indeed I'd give the nod often to digital. On a broader swathe of music that should suit both analog and digital, it often depends on the mastering. For me, that's a massive step fwd for digital, for this analog stalwart at least

Another way of looking at it, is where digital is second to analog, it's noticeably so, where digital is superior, it's a closer call, more just a subjective preference.

My ears pricked up when I saw the AE feedback an Wadax Ref dac analog-like mids density "breakthru". Surely if a dac was to truly shatter preconceptions, it would be precisely in this area.

Mid density breakthrough has little relevance actually. It just shows me the person doesn't listen to good vinyl violin recordings, or the good old rock recordings from vertigo etc, which had excellent bass. It also shows a lack of understanding of flow and continuity.

Sorry, but in case you want to make this an AE and digital vinyl thread, I am all game let's take this thread off track!

 

[spiritofmusic]

Maybe they actually have listened to those recordings on vinyl, and have finally found digital that works to their strengths.

 

[bonzo75]

Maybe they actually have listened to those recordings on vinyl, and have finally found digital that works to their strengths.

It's the density only in the mids that gives it away they haven't.

 

[spiritofmusic]

So, a bunch of vinylphiles who predominantly likely listen to classical, jazz, trad Chinese music, won't be aware of mids density on their fave lps, and whether this dac gets there? Very unlikely.

 

[Alinous]

I just received this very nice feedback from a customer I'd like to share in a Christmas spirit:


Dear Emile,

I wanted to give you a little gift for Christmas and so I took a very high resolution photograph 55mp and spent some time in Lightroom. Since the Extreme came into my life I have started looking forward everyday to listening to music again.

I am very grateful to you for this gift and want to express my thanks.

I have worked on my system and managed to improve the sound considerably over the past 10 days. I would say it is a 90% improvement from where I was two weeks ago. I have learned a lot during this process. The exciting part is that there is more to come.

One of my closest friends, who has a deeply impressive system came over today, after listening for a while he turned around and said to me this sound is so good it makes me want to sell my speakers and focus on Headphone listening. Now that is a change normally its the other way around!

From my family to yours we wish you all very happy Christmas and I for one look forward in anticipation of what the next year will hold.

If you would like the RAW version of this file please let me know and I can put it on Dropbox for you.

Warmest regards,

S

View attachment 60124

I hope for a Christmas in the first quarter of 2020

 

[nonesup]

Emile have you already received your EtherREGEN?

 

[Taiko Audio]

Emile have you already received your EtherREGEN?

No not yet.

 

[microstrip]

No not yet.

But I just got a notification from Fedex stating the Daiza's will be delivered tomorrow!

 

[howiebrou]

Could someone please let me know what else I would need to upgrade as a bare minimum in order not to disgrace the presence of a top flight server like the extreme? i hear talk about switches, usb thingies, etc. Right now my set up with my Sooloos uses basic modems, routers, and crappy 10 dollar switches and bog standard Cat5. Which is these is a no no and what would be the order of priority in improving these please?

 

[Rhapsody]

Could someone please let me know what else I would need to upgrade as a bare minimum in order not to disgrace the presence of a top flight server like the extreme? i hear talk about switches, usb thingies, etc. Right now my set up with my Sooloos uses basic modems, routers, and crappy 10 dollar switches and bog standard Cat5. Which is these is a no no and what would be the order of priority in improving these please?

I could tell you but Emile's answer will be better