Thread for all bricasti digital gear
Personally I’ve always had a soft spot for the bricasti dacs, they might not seem immediately stand out on first listen, but they’ve always impressed me in the long term with their level of refinement and how they feel like they get out of the way from the music and just let things happen pretty honestly. Personally really enjoy the m1’s and the m21, overall more neutral slightly smoother and relaxed signature that’s a larger focus on micro and organicness without sacrificing control and command, pretty reasonably open sounding overall and are able to be pretty technical but present that information pretty organically
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Thanks for creating this thread @M0N. Here’s a link to my post from earlier today about the MC1. Will have some detailed impressions of this thing soon.
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I reached out to Bricasti to ask about the MC1 I purchased since it was a demo unit from a local dealer. I’m mostly trying to understand if the MC1 which is in their professional lineup uses the same upgrades like the MDx board as the consumer lineup of dacs (m1, m3, m21). I didn’t really get an answer to that but I did learn that the dac is one year old as it was manufactured last December. And it does not need any updates / upgrades at this time so it’s the same MC1 that I would get new if I ordered one today. It’s also missing a screw in the top panel so they’ll be sending a replacement.
Listening now as it’s been on for about 8 hours so it is definitely warmed up. Working on putting some thoughts / more early impressions together. Think I’ll listen for a week or so then try and compare to the Pontus II directly with a switch that I have
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Are you able to select different types of linear or minimum filters? On the m1, there’s 9 different linear filters, and 6 different minimum filters. Looks like you don’t get that option here?
Also imo the DACs take multiple days to fully warm up so I’d make sure it’s just left on from now for best sound
And regarding the filters from my experience the minimums tend to be more relaxed and organic with the best liquidity with a bit of softness but not sacrificing technical ability, also better overall spatial recreation and more organic presentation. Linear filters tended to be more in your face with a bit more defined edges, better grip and control and a bit more dynamic but did feel a bit flatter when it came to lower level information and spatial recreation personally. I do think the minimum filters were my favorite and provided a better experience, but I can see the linear being helpful in some systems
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No the MC1 just has minimum and linear and does not have separate filters under those so just the two selectable options. That is one of the features missing from the M1. I’ve been listening on linear most of the time but will try both.
And yeah I plan to leave it on. Looks cool in the dark too with the red glow
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Ah very interesting, I guess they figure for a studio model that simplicity was the best. I wonder what filters they ended up going with then, or if they have filters exclusive for that dac
In the manual it says this about the filters but I don’t quite understand what they are describing.
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So it looks like filter 0 has been chosen then, personally I didn’t really like filter 0 on either mode, it was the most flat and uninvolving filter on the m1 and m21, but it was very damn linear and I guess that would make the most sense for a studio dac (although I’d still personally have used other filters if I were doing studio work anyways lol)
I’m honestly surprised they didn’t chose other filters that had lower latency
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ok interesting. I do have hqplayer so could play around with the filters in that, might have better results there
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You can try, but I personally felt doing any upsampling on the dac really really was not good, somewhat diminished quality since the dac already internally oversamples and there’s no way to bypass that. I actually think they specifically suggested me not to with the m21 but I’d have to look again. Still worth experimenting though lol
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ok well it’s something I usually try with most dacs so will just see what happens.
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I did try HQplayer last night with sinc-L and sinc-Mx filters and LNS15 dither. It does seem to change the sound a bit but I barely know the sound of the MC1 in a stock configuration so I won’t mess with hqplayer anymore until I get used to the dac.
I always end up trying a bunch of different things and connectivity when I get a new product instead of just listening to it so need to take some listening time before I start experimenting with things like filters, inputs, cabling, etc.
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Took off the lid of the MC1 and took some pictures of the internals which answers some of my questions. This dac does have the MDx module. It also uses most of the same parts from the M1 as you can see from the indications on the circuit boards.
Overview:
MDx:
Analog left and right:
Analog power left and right:
Digital power:
Front panel:
Hope you don’t mind all the pictures lol. Hope this helps others understand exactly what the MC1 is since I had no idea apart from some generic statements on Bricasti’s website.
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Yep that really does just look like an m1 without a preamp, less vibration control and isolation, and less filter options, that’s a good value if that’s the case. Also interesting they didn’t slim down the case height wise, seems like it’s larger than it needs to be
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Are you referring to the feet on the m1 se or are there other internal modifications to the m1 that help with vibration and isolation?
Ah that’s right it’s only on the SE or the gold, my bad
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Is the display board, I guess?
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PSU Board
Looks mostly “by the book” to me. An interesting aspect is the use of a pair of Op-Amps (type: LT1363) for something?
Since they are running what I would guess to be Linear Regulators with no way to report faults to a central command board, I have no idea what for. -
Is a “dumb” PSU board that just makes smooth-ish DC for the Digital board
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These ADC-boards are interesting. Shame none of the part numbers are legible.
- That Digital Board is loaded! Has a big boy DSP on it and an FPGA pulling all the strings.
Shame the part number of the Xmos chip is barely not readable
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There’s no display on the MC1 it’s just buttons but #1 is the board to control the front panel:
The part numbers on the chips were not clear even when looking inside myself. The phone camera doesn’t help but I can try and figure out what some of the chips say. The XMOS chip says something like G__92402 then PH6P6. It’s really hard to make out so will try and get some close ups another time but the marking on the chips were pretty faded.
Here’s a picture I found on another site comparing the old digital board (right) to the new MDx (left). It’s a bit clearer but still not great:
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The joys of laser engraved part numbers…
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