MSB Technology Reference DAC
REFERENCE AUDIO – WITHAM ESSEX
BOB’s Review Series - No 33 – MSB Technology Reference DAC/Preamp
Introduction – You might think I’m bonkers, you aren’t alone, but I couldn’t resist plugging my 20+year old Sony CD player worth less than £500 today into this DAC at more than 100 times the price, and yes, it sounded fabulous via RCA SP/DIF. I’m sure a high-end transport would be even better, but I couldn’t think of a better way to introduce myself to the MSB Reference DAC on review here. This is not my first experience of MSB DACs, I have also reviewed their Discrete DAC all the way back in Review No 3 but that was a mere £15,000 so hopefully the Reference DAC / Preamp at around £52,000 with the Preamp module fitted* (at the time of writing and before adding further extras such as better clock modules and additional analogue inputs) will bring something special to the party.
One thing I’ve come to appreciate with streamers and DACs or anything that has a high-end clock onboard is that they need to be allowed to stabilise and reach their operating temperatures before giving their best performance and the MSB Reference DAC is no exception. This usually takes at least 3 days before they stabilise, and serious listening can start. This applies after every turn on from cold so I’d recommend leaving such devices powered up 24/7 because if you turn them off after each listening session, they won’t sound their best again for a few days. The Reference DAC certainly improved over time and by day three was really starting to show its capabilities.
All MSB products are designed and manufactured in the American Silicon Valley. MSB stands for ‘Most Significant Bit’. They have been making modular DACs using their bespoke Ladder DACs technology since 1999. The reasoning behind adopting a modular design philosophy is to offer customers a choice at point of order or as a later upgrade over the amount and type of DAC and other modules that are installed.
Technology – Their Ladder DAC Technology is based on their Prime DAC Modules operating in fully balanced mode, their Discrete DAC uses a pair of their Prime DAC Modules, but the Reference DAC has 4 Hybrid DAC Modules that MSB say are a true balanced design that automatically switches between PCM and DSD data with zero compromises, the top end Select DAC has room for 8 Ladder DAC Hybrid modules. Well executed Ladder DACs are expensive to design and manufacture, hence the price of MSB DACs.
The MSB Reference DAC is a two-box affair, the DAC itself sits atop the Power Supply Unit. It Incorporates in-house designed twin clocks to maximise audio conversion and reduce jitter. One clock is reserved for the 44.1kHz family of signals and one for the 48kHz family or multiples thereof. The Reference DAC I am reviewing here came with their in-house designed Femto 140 clock module installed. If you were to buy a new one today it now comes as standard with their top range Femto 33 clock installed which used to be an optional upgrade costing almost £15,000. A new standard twin box Reference DAC now comes with the following modules factory fitted at an entry cost of £52,000 but it can have other modules added to allow it to input and output your desired connections. It doesn’t stop there however because this is not their top DAC, that honour goes to the Select DAC which will be a 6-figure purchase.
*The Reference DAC now comes as Standard as follows:
- 4 input slots
- SPDIF input module
- Preamp output module
- Femto 33 Clock
- Single Reference Powerbase (PSU)
The Retail Price for a standard unit as described above is £52,000 and to this you can add three more input modules of your choice.
The review sample came loaded with the following modules installed:
- Pre out module to allow it to act as a preamp with inputs and outputs on XLR
- Bay 1 – RCA single analogue input
- Bay 2 - *MSB ProISL interface optical MQA USB input
- *MSB ProUSB Input (a standalone optical connection device required to connect to the ProISL module)
- Bay 3 - Digital inputs on RCA and Optical Toslink and with a BNC World Clock output
- Bay 4 - Network Renderer with Roon Endpoint
- Femto 140 Clock
- Single Reference Powerbase (PSU)
* The ProUSB is a USB to ProISL converter and comes in a small external standalone box that accepts a standard USB connection from a computer or a streamer and converts it to an optical output. It then needs the ProISL module to be fitted to the Reference DAC which accepts the twin optical feed from the ProUSB device via a special optical cable, around 1.5m long making it 100% electrically isolated and allowing for very long cable lengths with no loss. The ProUSB device supports full MQA decoding to 24 bit and 768kHz playback and 8 x DSD support. The renderer input module can accept 32 bit files.
The retail price of some of the more common modules are as follows:
- ProISL Module including the ISL Adaptor - £2,080
- Renderer Input Module - £2,050
- Optical and Coaxial Input Module - £1,040
There is no headphone input as standard and not available as an add on module. The case is milled from a single block of aluminium and the rubberised spiked screw in feet are excellent. The Reference DAC is also a recognised Roon Endpoint.
The manufacturer suggests around 100 hours run in time and as the review sample had already seen a lot of use it only needed to warm through for a few days to get the femto clock nice and cosy before it started to really perform at its best.
The DAC and PSU both measure 444mm wide x 444mm deep and just 79mm high and are designed to be stacked. The DAC weighs 11kg and the PSU comes in at 26kg. The PSU connects to the DAC via twin 8 pin power leads around 400mm long and the PSU connects to the mains via a normal IEC 13-amp kettle type connector. The supplied remote control is a pleasure to use once you come to terms with its unusual button graphics and has a rotary volume control which just seems so obvious in its use and works wherever its pointed, more like a radio transmitter than an infrared connection. The remote is charged from a mini-USB C connector from suitable mains plug and charges to full within minutes.
All MSB DACs come in anodised matt silver or matt black finishes as standard but can be specified in virtually any colour you want at added cost. MSB make all parts for these DACs inhouse and the only part they outsource is the final polishing of the casework to ensure a specialist is responsible for meeting their high standards of finish.
From the menu button the following user selectable functions are accessible:
- Display brightness 1 to 8
- Display on/off
- Screen small/large
- Switch manual/smart/all (selects how the DAC selects a source)
- Reset
- DSD native/optimum
- Volume – set start up volume
- RenRem enable/disable remote control transport buttons to control the Render rather than the transport
- Analogue input on/off
- Port 4 on/off/bypass
- SN and Code – serial number and current firmware
System Components used in this Review:
Preamp: MSB Reference DAC (subject of this review) – Gryphon Essence Pre
Power Amplifier: The Gryphon Essence Stereo
Digital Sources: Innuos Statement Streamer – Sony CDP X3000ES CD
Analogue Sources: Meridian 204 Tuner
Streaming Sources: Tidal and Qobuz – Roon Management
Network: English Electric Network Switch and Innuos PhoenixNET Switch
Speakers: Marten Mingus Quintet
Performance – because of the flexibility of this DAC/Preamp there are many ways to connect sources to it and I tried most of them to see how they compared and to see how the Reference DAC performed both in digital and analogue mode, here is what I discovered:
ProISL USB connection – Connected in this way the Reference DAC was able to accept files up to 24bit and 705.6/768kHz depending on whether the source started life as a 44.1 or a 48kHz stream. But remember that the MSB Reference DAC does not upsample and to test how it behaved with high bit rate files I managed this via the Roon DSP settings to upsample before sending data to the DAC.
The Reference DAC performed at its best with the ProISL connection and by this, I mean better than almost any other DAC I have had the pleasure to review in my home system, only the Pilium Elektra DAC, the Nagra Tube DAC and the BAT REX 3 DAC have come close. But the MSB Reference DAC is in another league pricewise to these two DACs and it’s relatively easy to hear how your extra money is spent because it brings immediate clarity and enjoyment to the listening experience in every respect, right from the get-go.
The presentation from any of its input connection is vibrant and enchanting, lifting vocals and instruments to new heights of clarity and realism making it difficult to do other things whilst listening to this DAC, but the ProISL has the edge over the other inputs. It’s tonally delicate with timbre a plenty and so, so musical adding colour but not colouration. I could describe it like standing in Lothlorien amid the Eleanor flowers on a spring morning but that might be an emotive too far.
I have so many favourite test tracks none of which you are likely to hear at a HI-FI show and I explored all of them over the two weeks I had the Reference DAC at home. I can’t possibly go over all of them here but ‘The Division Bell’ by Pink Floyd (24bit/96Khz download file) was a particular delight with detail I had not heard or appreciated or experienced before, and it sounded almost as good via RCA analogue input from CD. David Gilmour has an amazing ability on all sorts of guitars and his efforts on this album via the Reference DAC was beyond most guitarists’ capabilities being vivid, delicate and intriguing all at the same time.
Of course, any system that can accommodate the Reference DAC pricewise needs to be highly resolving in itself and I’m a firm believer that the various components that make up a system need to find each other’s capabilities via a handshake of goodwill and once they do this they start to perform better. This handshake can take a few days to happen, and I guess it doesn’t make much sense electrically but in the real world it does. The Reference DAC was fully up for the handshake and when it happened it seemed to lift the rest of my system to heights it didn’t know it could achieve.
I tried more dynamic tracks such as ‘Push the Limits’ by Enigma and ‘Electrified II’ by Yello and again I was hearing sounds and resolution of detail I’d not heard before and entirely in a good way. Female and male vocals were entirely in the room believable and listening to Allan Taylor’s Behind the Mask album where he both sings and talks about his experiences with Banjo Man Derroll Adams was a great way to experience this realism.
Renderer Ethernet Connection – to test this input I connected the ethernet output on my Innuos Statement streamer to the ethernet renderer input on the Reference DAC and found that it was now able to accept 32-bit files at 705.6/768kHz whereas via USB this topped out at 24bit. I found this method to be no less revealing or entertaining than the USB connection but not perhaps quite as illuminating in its presentation. Your personal taste may of course differ to mine so don’t take this as gospel, you would need to decide for yourself which option sounds better, but I suspect to take full advantage of the onboard Femto Clock the USB connection is the way to go.
Via ethernet connections I find that most DACs seem to unfold MQA files to their fullest extent which via USB connection never seems to be the case but I stand to be corrected on this. I know that some will say MQA interferes with the artists presentation of his music but I’m not so sure they have as much control over this as they think they have especially when albums are at the mastering stage and for me, not knowing what the artist thinks he had in mind at the time makes no difference to me. I find MQA and MQA Studio files sound just great, particularly via the MSB reference DAC.
‘Museum’ by Gretchen Peters sounded as real as I’ve ever heard this track with full emotion in her voice and her breath between verses clearly apparent. ‘Imogene’ was free of any artifice imposed by the system with her located centre stage surrounded by her band. All the micro detail of this track was intact without it becoming fatiguing or overly bright.
‘You’ve Got to Give Me Room’ by Oleta Adams is an expansive track that seems to spread wider than the space between speakers but it needs the volume turned up to sound its best, so I obliged and the track via the MSB Reference DAC had me spellbound. The sheer beauty of her voice and the way she can hold a note in perfect pitch was expanded by the performance of the Reference DAC, only a few DACs can get to this level of performance without compromise.
So, whilst the USB input is probably the better way to go using it via the renderer input had almost no discernible impact on sound quality and it could save you some cash provided you have a source that can output a signal on ethernet. The Reference DAC is not a streamer so It can’t be connected directly to a NAS drive.
RCA and Optical SPDIF Connection – Both these inputs worked extremely well when connected to a CD transport and the only differences I heard were probably more to do with the quality of the Transport than the differing connection methods to the reference DAC.
RCA Analogue Input – Again I connected a CD player but this time as a player and not a transport and to the RCA analogue inputs on the Reference DAC and now the unit was using its fully analogue volume control to drive the preamp to act essentially as would a normal preamp with the DAC onboard the CD player. This is only possible because the volume control does not act in the digital realm. Connected in this way and listening to a variety of CDs I began to think I didn’t need a dedicated preamp after all because the Reference DAC was driving my power amp like it had a new lease of life. Amongst other CDs I listened again to ‘The Division Bell’and was just as impressed as I was via the digital USB or renderer inputs. Listening to Mike Oldfield’s ‘Return to Ommadawn’ on CD it was resolved with great pace and rhythm, detailed but not overbright but full of life and detail.
Not many of us need lots of analogue inputs these days and if you only need one to connect your favourite CD player, tuner or the output of a phono stage then the single input on the Reference DAC will meet all your needs.
Conclusion – I’m not likely to be able to afford a DAC/Pre at this price point but if I was then the Reference DAC from MSB would be high on my short list along perhaps with something from Nagra, Pilium and BAT. All of these DACs push the current envelope of what is possible, who would have thought back in the 80’s that such performance could be achieved from a digital source. Those critics of early CDs would be astounded to hear how this DAC surpasses analogue even from 30+ year old CDs.
Delicacy of timbre, passion and regret, emotion and delight, a picture window onto the world beyond your system, this Reference DAC has it all and will soon become a very good and faithful friend when installed in your reference system.
The MSB Reference DAC performed faultlessly all the time I was using it. Above this in the MSB catalogue is the Select DAC with its twin power supplies and 8 Hybrid DAC modules costing more than twice the price of the reference DAC, perhaps a review for another day!
Would I prefer to own a BMW M2? It would depend on what day and what time of the year I was asked this question, they are both fantastic machines and in an ideal world I'd own both.
Highly recommended.
Bob – Team Reference Audio