Dual Mono DAC AK4490/AK4497

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tony71

Member
Joined 2006
I have the first (blue) Weiliang dual version board. It was the second dual board i have bought, and i am using it now for about 4 months. First board i bought was a different designer, and i didn`t liked that one.
I also had the Weiliang single blue board version.

Ive changed the opamps to opa1611 and opa1612. I am very happy with the board.
I think (subjective) that the sound is great. This one has the changeable filters.

I did see this new version Weiliang board on the net, and it looks some different from the blue version. Better layout?
I am no technician, so i can`t judge in that view.

If the board layout is better, maybe i will buy one. But in a view months the new AK4499eq will arrive in products.
Secondly, Amir on AudioScienceReview has someone send him the blue version pcb. So he is going to measure it on the output.

I will wait for the measurements off that board. If they are good, ill have no doubt, the new board will be good to.

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
 
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quantran

Member
Joined 2004
If using ak449x chip I can’t imagine how you can beat the aune s16 dac that sell for about $600. It has the exotic crystek low jitter clocks, Altera FPGA chip, a nice toroidal transformer and many other goods parts. It’s layout looks excellent. Please see the photo.
 

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Thorp

Member
Joined 2013
I have no doubts that Aune s16 is a very decent DAC:
- isolated I2S;
- FPGA FIFO + high quality oscillators re-clock
- it seems to have well designed analog output, including headphones amp;
- very decent DAC chip;
- many inputs and outputs, actually all of them (speaking about a DAC)
- etc.
I agree, it is hard to beat it.

but
its price in Europe (where I live) actually is 800 Euro, including all taxes.
That means 900 $. At this point, I can imagine a lot of ways how a diy-er can easily beat it.
 
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quantran

Member
Joined 2004
Thorp said:
I have no doubts that Aune s16 is a very decent DAC:
- isolated I2S;
- FPGA FIFO + high quality oscillators re-clock
- it seems to have well designed analog output, including headphones amp;
- very decent DAC chip;
- many inputs and outputs, actually all of them (speaking about a DAC)
- etc.
I agree, it is hard to beat it.

but
its price in Europe (where I live) actually is 800 Euro, including all taxes.
That means 900 $. At this point, I can imagine a lot of ways how a diy-er can easily beat it.
Click to expand...

I agree with you. However one would need to spend a huge amount of time fine tuning the design to sound really better. It’s ok if the time spent is fun though.

The diyinhk board at the beginning of this threat is too basic and very difficult to tweak it to the level of the S16.
 
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Thorp

Member
Joined 2013
quantran said:
I agree with you. However one would need to spend a huge amount of time fine tuning the design to sound really better. It’s ok if the time spent is fun though.
Click to expand...
I believe that is not such a huge amount of time needed, many of this steps were already done.
Look at Aune S16 design, it is pragmatically simple. A DAC should be a DAC, but not a (D)SP. It have to be a high-fidelity device, but not necessary a high-good-sounding device (this differs from person to person). It is hard and unnatural to change the sound parameters rolling op-amps or raising/manipulating system distortions in order to obtain a sound who doesn't exist in the original recording. I have past the "audiophile" era. :)
It is not my intention to repeat what I said in my previous post about Aune's pluses, but so should be a DAC: isolate unavoidable noise, minimize jitter as much as possible, use high quality components, keep the design simple - from my experience they can be mostly found in the DAC chip datasheet/application notes.
 
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Blade2019

Banned
Joined 2019
I must say that I'm not satisfied with dual ak4497 I bought.Unfortunately, usb input does not work as it should. I've tried with xmos and amanero card as well and it does not work( I must emphasize that both of those cards work with other dacs). Only things that actually work are optical and coaxialy- digital input
 
Bassivus

Bassivus

Member
Joined 2004
ozcal said:
I am using some of his earlier boards in my dac and they appear to be very good. Also using Burson opamps.
Click to expand...

I went for finished dac simply because there was no DIY board with AK4497 chip from him available. I want also to change xtals in xmos for better. But it sound remarkable already. I also changed regs in digital part:
 

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Subbu K

Subbu K

Member
Joined 2010
Paid Member
Hello, I am also having the same issue and USB doesn't work. Did you get any help from the seller? I assume the firmware is incorrect on the board or the design itself is buggy. The PCB inside is blue color.

If I get the interface diagrams, I can write my own software to control the DAC.

Regards,
Subbu

Blade2019 said:
I must say that I'm not satisfied with dual ak4497 I bought.Unfortunately, usb input does not work as it should. I've tried with xmos and amanero card as well and it does not work( I must emphasize that both of those cards work with other dacs). Only things that actually work are optical and coaxialy- digital input
Click to expand...
 
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Thaocctv

Member
Joined 2020
Blade2019 said:
I must say that I'm not satisfied with dual ak4497 I bought.Unfortunately, usb input does not work as it should. I've tried with xmos and amanero card as well and it does not work( I must emphasize that both of those cards work with other dacs). Only things that actually work are optical and coaxialy- digital input
Click to expand...
I same with you, I think it has a problem in MCU, lack of code. You can use USB if you unplug pin 4 cable connecting from main DAC and MCU from main DAC.
 

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