Music Hall 25.3 DAC discrete opamps

Rich’s Burson V4 Opamp with Music Hall dac25.3

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Post Info

I am up and running and the Burson HD op amps are a very worthwhile addition. Wow! The tube side of the Music Hall 25.3 DAC isn’t so soggy anymore.

The big benefit was to the balanced SS output, which bypasses the tube and output caps. The bass was kind of soft before, sounded thin. Now I have bass, nuance and weight to the music. It tuned this $600 retail DAC into something special.

Rich O

The System

Listening with

Music Hall dac25.3 · DAC with tube (6922) single-ended output and headphone amp · discontinued
  • Frequency response: 2 Hz – 20 kHz (±0.2 dB)
  • Output impedance: 0.3 Ω (headphone)
  • Output voltage: RCA 2.0 V · XLR 2.0 V (single “output level” figure published)
  • Inputs: coaxial; optical; AES/EBU (XLR); USB (24/96)
  • Outputs: RCA (tube); XLR (solid-state balanced); 6.35 mm headphone (4 V max, 0.3 Ω)
  • DAC / chipset: TI / Burr-Brown PCM1796; TI SRC4192 ASRC (96 / 192 kHz upsampling)
  • Other: THD+N <0.04% tube / <0.0015% balanced (1 kHz); SNR >110 dB; dynamic range >120 dB (24-bit); crosstalk <-110 dB; <30 W

[1] [2]

Burson

Burson V4 Opamp · Discrete opamp (single / dual) · discontinued
  • Supply voltage: ±5 V to ±20 V (absolute maximum)
  • Gain-bandwidth product: 50 MHz (at 100 kHz)
  • Dual or single: dual and single
  • Package: dual 40 mm × 16 mm × 20 mm; single 40 mm × 16 mm × 14 mm; 8-pin

[3] [4]

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. Music Hall dac25.3: manualslib.com
  2. Music Hall dac25.3: theturntablestore.com
  3. Burson V4 Opamp datasheet V1.1
  4. Burson V4 Opamp product page (archived 2015)