ЦАПы — Musical Fidelity M8x DAC

The M8x DAC is a 483 mm wide DAC made by Musical Fidelity which also houses a balanced headphone amplifier. It converts through two Sabre ES9038Q2M chips and follows a fully balanced circuit layout from the conversion stage to the analogue outputs. It deliberately leaves out a display, WiFi and Bluetooth.

Key specs that matter

The two ES9038Q2M chips work in a dual differential, dual mono configuration based on the 32-bit Hyperstream II circuit. USB accepts PCM up to 768 kHz, DSD256 via DoP and native DSD512, while the three optical sockets and the single coaxial socket take 24-bit 192 kHz PCM, MQA at 384 kHz and DoP DSD64. There is also an AES/EBU input for 24-bit 192 kHz and a CD I2S link. Frequency response deviates less than 0.1 dB from 10 Hz to 20 kHz, THD+N stays below 0.001% at 1 kHz, and SNR exceeds 100 dB A-weighted. Channel separation is better than 114 dB at 10 kHz, and total correlated jitter is under 100 femtoseconds peak to peak. RCA outputs deliver 2 V RMS and XLR outputs 4 V RMS, each able to run at a fixed or a variable level, with an output impedance under 100 ohms.

Engineering and use context

The analogue amplification is discrete Class A with no integrated circuits in the signal path. Eight digital filters are selectable, upsampling and reclocking can be switched in, and an oversampling bypass mode is offered for very high sample rates. Full MQA hardware decoding covers USB and SPDIF. Processing is handled by a 16-core XMOS chip and a CPLD MAX II Altera device, and power comes from a Super Silent transformer. The heavy aluminium chassis is designed to act as a Faraday cage. The headphone section is discrete and balanced with DC-coupled power transistors, delivering 3.9 W into 8 ohms, 3.2 W into 32 ohms and 400 mW into 300 ohms balanced, or 2 W into 8 ohms from the single-ended jack. It stays in Class A up to full power for headphones of 30 ohms or more, has an output impedance under 5 ohms and uses a 6.3 mm jack plus a 4-pin XLR socket. The unit measures 483 x 102 x 381 mm, weighs 10.6 kg, draws up to 70 W and under 0.5 W in standby, and is Roon Tested.

Pairing

With variable XLR and RCA outputs the M8x DAC is able to set the level for a connected power stage itself, and its trigger input and output let other units in the chain power up with it. The CD I2S input sends a 16.9344 MHz master clock back to a compatible transport, and voltage is factory preset to 115 or 230 V AC with 100 V as an option.

Alternatives

The Musical Fidelity Nu-Vista DAC is a same-brand converter that also uses two ES9038Q2M chips in dual differential mode, housed in a 21.5 kg chassis with nuvistor valves.