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To prep for the inevitable PCM vs. DSD clash, I collected material created by credible recording engineers to insure that all file formats would compete on equal footing. My first port of call was Morton Lindberg of Norwegian label 2L. This link is a free resource. Here one can download 24/352.8 PCM, DSD64 and DSD128 equivalents of the same DXD master to get acquainted with various sonic virtues.
The Vega hides its Sabre chip beneath this snazzy little cover.
"DXD is fancy 'branding' from Philips and Merging Technologies for what is ordinary linear PCM in 24bit 352.8kHz. For our session recordings, a DAD AX-24 converter makes a raw sampling at 5-bit 5.6448MHz. This raw stream can either be formatted by integer values to DSD (1-bit 2.8224MHz) or to DXD (24/352.8). We have chosen the latter for its abilities during post-production processing. This resolution is preserved all throughout the editing, mixing and mastering.

(The mere fact that Audirvana accesses PureMusic-generated DSD proxy files—though it reads them as 176.4kHz PCM—suggests that Damian Plisson must have licensed Rob Robinson's patent-pending proxy scheme though I've never seen an open acknowledgement or credit.)
"From our DXD masters we run Weiss Saracon software to downsample to the popular music distribution formats of DSD128, DSD64 and high-resolution PCM." Some of Morton's PCM files are in WAV format which iTunes can play natively. Thus don't reformat such files to AIFF or 24-bit data will get automatically truncated to 16 bits. Others are FLAC. PureMusic makes iTunes import of FLAC and DSD child's play. You might however want to rename such files should they show up with you as the artist and 'download' or 'desktop' as album names. Your personalized renaming could end up looking and sorting like my above screen capture perhaps.
I also downloaded four samplers from Swedish label Opus 3, two in DSD64, two of the same music in DSD128. Then reader Ted Brady dropbox'd me three tracks from Massimo Gon's CD of Franz Liszt material in both 384kHz PCM and DSD128 because those tracks were recorded in parallel in either format to involve no conversion whatsoever.


Vega's display confirms formats. So does PureMusic (see small green writing above). But the player software can distinguish between native/resampled rates as created with its own 64-bit filter set to an upsampling mode or enforced downsampling when your DAC can't cope with a higher rate. For obvious reasons the Vega can't tell the native difference. It only sees incoming data, not what was done to it in preceding software.


In use Vega's menu navigation is as intuitive as the machine's industrial design is classy and minimalist. The critical 'exact' clock setting requires that the machine be on for an hour. But only the first time. If you select 'sleep' mode upon turn-off —press the single volume/selector control for 2 seconds to see the option come up—the clock remains at thermal readiness. Now it's available at extreme tolerance from the very start of the next session. And I deliberately didn't read the manual. Everything was perfectly self-explanatory. A balance control with full-scale 0 to 99 attenuation per channel and reassignation of the +/- volume buttons on the remote simply were unexpected if welcome surprises. This is a very mature and friendly interface. By using the oldest method of all (push to call up menu or select item, turn to scroll, hold in to power down), AURALiC delivers hi-tech for dummies. That's a major compliment!

Auto/coarse vs. exact. Company claims for audible superiority of their best-tolerance clock setting aren't hot air. The decisive difference is depth & space. There's appreciably greater recreation of the recorded venue which manifests as an enhanced depth perspective. More audible space also creates more performer body as a function of higher 3D contrast and less 2D flatness. If more precise clocking equals lower jitter, the upshot is that at least one effect of jitter suppression is superior ambient recovery. In use my quad-core iMac with KingRex 'biwire' USB cable produced no hiccups or dropouts from this setting. This suggests that AURALiC's firmware had been expertly tweaked to account for real-world latency figures of standard computer hardware and its operational systems.

Digital/analog volume. To create a best-case scenario for digital volume, I connected the Vega to the Thrax Audio Heros monos set to 4V input sensitivity. Those connected to 88dB Aries Cerat Stentor speakers with 30-part precision crossovers as my least efficient most reactive load in the house. This setup had standard listening levels between 50 and 60 on the Vega's 100-max display. I thus invoked between 40 and 50dB of signal cut in the digital domain. Swapping in my new Nagra Jazz preamp in 0dB gain mode with the Vega back at 100 became decidedly more dimensional, billowy, fluid and embodied. This demonstrated in completely unambiguous terms how despite fancy numbers magic, a truly superior preamp still retained a very significant advantage. At even lower levels (-70 to -80dB) the contrast was painful. Going DAC-direct sounded stripped, stark and flat. Audible space and all its connective tissue had collapsed and all prior tonal and textural elegance abandoned. Whilst theory would beg to differ, the age of preamps hasn't expired yet though digital converters with analog volume controls like Nagra's forthcoming 384kHz DSD-ready machine should arguably ring in the death knell.
The 384kHz USB transceiver board.

As we'll see next, as fixed-output DAC it's major chapeau time for the Vega. It's sonically quite different from my reference Metrum Hex. This is an interesting comparison Aussie contributor John Darko too will investigate in full for his own publication whilst giving us a brief second opinion here. Former contributor Michael Lavorgna, in his review of the Metrum Hex for AudioStream.com, hinted at the same difference such: "... one really couldn't ask for a more opposite side of the DAC design coin... I'd say the Vega is equally if not more involving albeit in a very different manner. The Vega digs in deep to uncover every single subtle nuance of the music being made, a micro view that sounds like you're hearing every bit in the recording. In comparison, the Hex offers up less of the micro-picture while still sounding perfectly resolute. I will talk more about the Vega in its very own review but I thought it important to point out that two very differing paths can lead you to the same place, namely musical enjoyment." Quite so!
The bits facing the class A Orfeo output modules which tuck into gleaming casings topped by a ribbed heatsink.
When coarse isn't enough. As a brief aside, like Burson's Conductor also based on the "freaky" Sabre 9018 chip, the Vega refused to play nice with my Cambridge Audio iD100 digital iPod dock. Never mind the costly Tombo Trøn digital cable between them and the coarse clock setting, there were dropouts as regular as church bells pinging quarter hours. The Metrum Hex digests iD100 digits all day long without a single hiccup. The Vega was fine with the equivalent Pure dock just as the Conductor is. The Cambridge's S/PDIF feed is simply too irregular to get any love from Sabre's finicky silicon. Not that it's likely someone would spend €3.300 on a DAC and mate it to a $299 iPod dock.
This AC filter module tucks beneath a yellow plastic cover which I removed for this shot.