Imaging, wider, deeper soundstage

Not worth it's asking price

I am using the MSB Link III with the upsampling kit installed. I have been listening to it for 7 months already and is fully broken in. I have purposely delayed posting a review on this product because the difference I heard over the internal DAC of Rotel RCD 971 and the Pioneer DV-525 was not as I expected as gleaned from the various reviews in this site and elsewhere. Yes there was an improvement. The imaging became more focus and the soundstage is wider and a bit deeper than both the Rotel and the Pioneer. It’s not a night and day difference, the kind of difference that only becomes apparent after careful listening. The MSB is also more laid back (as if the singer is 1 to 2 feet behind) in its presentation than the Rotel. I get a slight more detail through the Rotel alone than if it’s fed through the MSB. On the bass issue, MSB has more bass than the Pioneer, it’s tighter and more extended. But the Rotel took the bass one step higher, it’s even more tighter and extended with control resulting in full bodied sound.

The upsampling confuses me up to now. It works on some recordings giving the music more details. But on most recordings I hear no difference at all from the regular 16/44. Everything is the same, details, bass, soundstage, etc.

I feel that the improvement I got is not worth the $350.00 I paid for it. Frankly, I can leave without it.

Those of you considering to but this affordable DAC. My advice is: try before you buy. There is nothing like hearing this on your own system. Be sure that you will be happy with the improvement before you hand down those precious bucks.

My system consists of:

Bryston B-60 integrated
Rotel RCD-971
B&W 602 S2
DH Labs BL1 S2
DH Labs T-14
MSB Link DAC III

Exceptional presentation of sound with impeccable imaging, excellent overall value, flexible and upgradeable design.

Terrible case design/quality, questionable quality control, very poor customer service/support, worst Toslink connector on the planet, lack of outside switches to set options (you have to open up the unit.)

The unit being reviewed here is actually the Link DAC III, although I understand there are supposedly few differences between the three generations of the Link DAC.

I was very impressed with all the good press this unit was getting and the price was certainly attractive, so I had to check it out. The story of acquiring and living with this DAC is a love/hate affair filled with both frustration and warm embrace. I apologize in advance for this rather long review, which tends to be more of a subjective experience story than anything else.

I purchased my unit directly from MSB via their informative and well-designed website (which it appears they have sadly abandoned in lieu of the lackluster and very UN-informative alternative of selling through a generic third party which provides virtually NO information on their products - what gives?)

In any event, I was rather thrilled to see all the options available for this DAC. I decided to go all out and ordered the following:

- Link DAC III
- Half-Nelson Upgrade (audiophile component replacement)
- Up-sampling Option (up-samples to 96 or 132.2 kHz)
- HDCD Option

All options took a $399.00 base unit up to $998.00! I had high hopes for this bad boy!

I was promised delivery by the end of the following week. My credit card was charged by MSB immediately. When the initial delivery date passed, I called them and they gave me another delivery date of one week later. The new delivery date came and went with no sign of the Link DAC so I called them again. I was given yet another delivery date of one week later. This date too came and went with still no sign of product. A fourth call to MSB yielded yet another promised date of (you guessed it) one week later. On this fourth date, product finally arrived after having to wait over one month! I find both the practices of charging for product before shipment and stringing the customer along with false promises of delivery to be highly unethical. Needless to say I was becoming very apprehensive!

My initial impression after taking the Link DAC out of the box was not overwhelmingly positive. One look at the case made me cringe. While the photos I have seen of the unit looked very nice it is not until you see it first-hand that you realize the case is nothing more than a huge piece of low-quality (yet thick) sheet metal folded to form a case. Obviously, this was a cost-cutting measure over a more conventional and "properly designed" case and I figured as long as the electronics delivered it wouldn't be that big of a deal. My only real concern was a real possibility that such a case would be prone to resonance that could find its way into the audio stream.

The real test came when I hooked up the unit. I used the digital output of my CD player and hooked it up to the digital input of the Link DAC (using a digital cable also purchased from MSB). Right away it played sweet-sounding music at the standard 44.1 kHz. The unit has a switch in the back that activates the up-sampling option. I flipped the switch only to be met with the worst sound I have ever heard from a CD! Where the up-sampling supposedly smoothes out the sound and lowers the sound floor, it actually sounded much more abrasive with an incredible amount of noise and distortion!

At this point I disconnected everything and opened up the case. I was very surprised to see that the electronics take up less than 1/3 of the space in the case! I assume that the case is designed to be way oversized so that you can place it under just about any CD player. While I can certainly appreciate that, I would rather have a smaller more appropriately designed case that would be less prone to resonance.

In any event, I reseated the up-sampling and HDCD option boards to make sure the connections were good (they were both loose.) I tried playing the unit again and still got the harsh sound with up-sampling turned on. I called MSB’s tech support and was transferred to probably the rudest and most clueless person at the company. To make a long story short, I threatened to return the entire unit for a refund when I was finally transferred to someone who knew what the hell was going on. It turns out the HDCD option is incompatible with the up-sampling option! The gentleman informed me that there is no way I should have been sold the two options in the same unit and that everyone at the company knows this. With this being said, I am left scratching my head why this critical bit of info was not caught by:

1. The salesperson who took my order
2. The individual who assembled and (supposedly) tested the unit
3. The initial “tech support” person I originally spoke to about the problem

Luckily, I was able to send the HDCD board back for a full refund, although MSB refused to pay for return shipping even though the problem was their fault! Are you starting to see a pattern here?

After removing the HDCD option board the unit started performing flawlessly. At this point I decided to let the unit “break-in” for the 100+ hours as recommended by the manufacturer. I played numerous different types of music CD’s through the unit (both with up-sampling turned on and off) on continuous play over the course of the next week without actually listening. At the end of this break-in period I began my critical listening evaluation.

In a word, I would call the Link DAC III’s performance “breathtaking”. Its imaging and presentation is spot-on with incredible dynamic range and substance. I found performance to be unquestionably exceptional from top to bottom. All this with up-sampling to 132.2 kHz turned on. I cannot say for certain how much of this incredible output is due to the Half-Nelson component upgrade but for any contribution it may have I would say that it is definitely worth it (although the $385.00 price tag for this upgrade was a bit hard to swallow – electronic savvy individuals can probably save a bundle by performing this upgrade themselves.)

Spectacular performance from the Link DAC III was consistently pleasing and non-fatiguing for hours on end, covering a wide range of recorded material. After a few hours the only thing I really noticed was perhaps a bit of a “too laid back” quality to the presentation. Since I was using the Link DAC III in a tube environment, I thought perhaps this might have something to do with it, although I had never experienced this with other players/DACs in the same setup. I thought maybe the up-sampling might be contributing to the laid-back gloss so I switched down to standard 44.1 kHz. That was it, all right. At standard 44.1 kHz the Link DAC III still sounded exceptional and the laid-back gloss disappeared. However, after a bit of listening, it started to sound a tad shrill and fatiguing (not surprising since this has been my experience with virtually any player/DAC.) I switched the up-sampling back on and was relieved to discover the full, rich sound that I had been experiencing prior. The laid-back aspect was not immediately apparent, but did creep back up on me after further extended listening. I must say that I prefer the up-sampling experience over standard presentation by a long shot. One thing I have yet to try is to set up-sampling to the optional 96 kHz in lieu of the 132.2 kHz setting. This may actually result in a happy medium. Unfortunately, there is no way to set this outwardly. You must open up the unit and set a jumper switch, which is mightily inconvenient. It sure would be nice to be able to flip a switch to set either up-sampling option.

It is here that one might think the review to be complete, but always in search of sonic nirvana, this reviewer is never satisfied. I have always been a strong proponent of jitter filters for getting the most performance out of a player and DAC. I own two Camelot Dragon 5.1 jitter filters and decided to hook one up between my player and the Link DAC III. To make a long story short, the Link DAC III absolutely refuses to work with the Dragon via the DAC’s digital input. It will, however, work via its Toslink input! I tried three different players, swapped Dragons, swapped the Link DAC III into an entirely different system, tried reconfiguring the Link DAC III in every conceivable way and it absolutely, positively would not work at all via the Digital input! Another call to MSB about the problem resulted in flat-out denial that there could possibly be anything wrong on their end. I called Camelot about the problem and they were extremely friendly and helpful and even offered to have their engineers look at the problem if I sent them the DAC!

Rather than go that route I figured I would just relegate myself to using the Toslink input on the Link DAC III. This option would be fine except that the Toslink input connector on the Link DAC III is the absolute worst I have EVER encountered! I have numerous different Toslink cables in my home theater setup from varying manufacturers and NONE of them would seat well with the Link DAC III. All of them would just kind of hang there and even the slightest of movements would cause the cable to come loose causing drop-outs in the audio.

At this point I became determined to get the Dragon to work with the Link DAC III using the digital input. I totally disassembled the Link DAC III and went over the circuit board with a fine-tooth comb. I was appalled to find FIVE component connections on the board that were not soldered (the connectors were simply bended into place.) I’m proficient enough with a solder gun that I was able to remedy that situation but it really left me shaking my head. It would have been nice if that fixed the Dragon compatibility problem but it did not.

Rather than continue to fuss with this problem I ultimately abandoned the idea of using a jitter filter with the Link DAC III altogether. The player I was using already has advanced jitter-filtering circuitry and (supposedly) the Link DAC III up-sampling board adds another level of jitter filtering. I just convinced myself that this was good enough.

If you’re still with me at this point, your perseverance must be applauded, as I do tend to ramble on. In summary I must say that the Link DAC III is an exceptional beast but not without its problems and limitations. On a strictly performance level I would like to give the unit five stars, but design flaws and limitations force me to knock it down a notch and the terrible service and support offered by MSB must take it down another notch. As for the value rating the story is pretty much the same, but I’m only going to take it down one notch here.

If your audio needs are simple and you will not be too demanding of the Link DAC III then it is a good way to go to get exceptional performance from your player. However, the demanding consumer may wish to look at higher-level products since very possible frustrations with this unit may not be sufficiently offset by its value.

Similar Products Used:

Any external DAC.

None.

Worse D/A conversion than in my CD player.

What a mistake I made buying this unit! And what a nightmare dealing with MSB!

I bought the unit in January 2000. When I hooked it up to my system, not only did I hear a loss of sound quality, I experienced skipping of my compact discs. My system is a Sunfire amp and preamp, Carver MV-5 CD changer, and Carver AL-III+ speakers. The skipping was eventually determined to be a problem with my CD player that needed repair, but that aside, the Link DAC made my system sound worse than it did without the unit.

I contacted MSB by e-mail because I thought I had a defective unit. I contacted the person whose card had been included with the unit as the contact person. That person indicated she could not help me and referred me to somebody else. I waited 2 weeks to hear from "Scott." I never heard from him so by the middle of February I called MSB (1 month after initial purchase). I finally reached Scott and he claimed they had been "too busy" to respond to me. He said that the D/A converter in their Link DAC is not as good as the internal D/A converters found in most CD players. He also agreed to let me return the unit for testing to see if it was defective.

AT THAT POINT, I FOUND OUT FOR THE FIRST TIME, THAT THERE WAS A 20% RESTOCKING FEE IF THE UNIT TURNED OUT NOT TO BE DEFECTIVE! IF I HAD KNOWN THAT NON-DEFECTIVE RETURNS HAD A 20% RESTOCKING FEE, I NEVER WOULD HAVE BOUGHT THE UNIT IN THE FIRST PLACE! THERE WAS NO NOTICE ON THEIR WEBSITE WHEN I MADE THE PURCHASE NOR WAS THERE ANY MENTION OF THIS POLICY IN THE LITERATURE (OR LACK THEREOF) THAT CAME WITH THIS UNIT.

So in the middle of February I sent the unit back. By late March, I still had had no response from MSB, so I sent them a letter threatening legal action unless I received my return credit from them. I finally received the credit in late March and a letter of apology for the delay. It seems that the President of MSB insisted that the 20% restocking fee be charged despite the objections of many of the employees.

Long story short---I ended up being out $100 on the deal due to their return policy and shipping. I will never buy anything else from MSB!

Similar Products Used:

None.

Bass, bass, and more bass! A no-brainer to set up. Runs cool and sits under my Sony receiver real nice. Oh yeah, it sounds better than the DAC in the CD player. :-)

The chassis is a bit ungainly in order to accomodate it's upgradeability. It's not MSB's fault, but the physical format of Toslink is miserable! You cannot install the cable without looking at BOTH the cable connector and the receptacle. It's worse that trying to install hard drive cables! The designer of Toslink should have his/her genitals and that of his significant other(s) mangled to the spec. It would be perfect birth control! If that wasn't enough, there is no friction fit or locking - I had to tape the cable nearby so it wouldn't fall out.

I got the Link III DAC with stock power adapter. Rather than make another product heading, I put it here because the Link 1, 2, and 3's are supposed to be sonically identical.
There are a ton of other good reviews of this product on this site - which was the most useful in making my decision to buy, unheard - so I'll just mention a few things I noticed.
First, I have a recording I heard on 4 different CD players I've owned. Ambient city traffic noise and music fade in from silence. There has always been what I thought was quantization noise during fade in, from the recording process itself. It was mild and heard only with earphones. I like the tune, so I put it on to see what new bass the Link would dredge up. I forgot to listen to the rest of the song after I heard the fade in! Not only that, it seems the noise floor dropped on, even, completely digital recordings.
My guess is that all the new bass the Link finds is now reproduced "in its own space", so that it's no longer interpreted as noise. This "noise reduction" helps out some disks that I thought were just badly recorded, especially older rock albums.
Here is a list of my equipment:
Sony receiver str-GX7es, 120W/ch.
Behringer UltraCurve 1/3rd octave digital equalizer/RTA
AudioSource Subharmonic Synthesizer
Paradigm Monitor 3 loudspeakers
Sunfire Subwoofer Mk. II
Technics CD changer SL-PD8
FMR Audio Real Nice Compressor(4/1ratio@-5db)
PSAudio ps300 AC Regenerator-MultiWave on order!
(Because everything except the subwoofer is plugged into the ps300, I don't feel it necessary to upgrade the MSB power adapter)
RadioShack RCA cables and Toslink(2m)
Monster Cable 10ga. speaker cables

Yes, I'm happy with my Link DAC!

Similar Products Used:

None, I'm branching out.