ASUS Xonar Essence ST sound card upgrade with Burson Discrete V5 opamp

Published on

Post Info

The best thing I`ve ever heard. Good positioning of the instruments and voices. I am really impressed with those three opamps.

The System

Listening with

ASUS Xonar Essence ST · Sound card: PCI sound card with headphone amp · discontinued
  • Frequency response: 10 Hz – 90 kHz (-3 dB, 96 kHz)
  • Output impedance: not published
  • Output voltage: RCA 2 V (line out)
  • Inputs: PCI; line/mic 6.35 mm
  • Outputs: RCA line out; 6.35 mm headphone; coax/optical S/PDIF
  • DAC / chipset: TI Burr-Brown PCM1792A; TI TPA6120A2 headphone amp
  • Other: headphone out optimised for 32-600 Ω; S/N 124 dBA line / 110 dBA headphone; THD 0.0003% line / 0.001% headphone; 16/24-bit, to 192 kHz

[1] [2]

Burson

Burson V5 Opamp · Discrete opamp (single / dual) · discontinued
  • Supply voltage: ±3.5 V to ±15 V (absolute maximum)
  • Gain-bandwidth product: 50 MHz (at 100 kHz)
  • Dual or single: dual and single
  • Package: 14.5 mm wide × 12.4 mm deep × 29 mm high (V5-OPA-D)

[3]

Specs from manufacturer data unless a source below says otherwise. “calc.” values are worked out from those figures (V = √(P × R); 110 dB SPL used as a loud reference level). Gear listed without specs is not in our spec library yet.

  1. ASUS Xonar Essence ST: stereophile.com (magazine reproduction of asus spec + manual archive)
  2. ASUS Xonar Essence ST: manualsdir.com (magazine reproduction of asus spec + manual archive)
  3. Burson V5 Opamp datasheet V1.1