For what it’s worth, I’m even seeing 2541’s at under $1.5k in the used market:
(EDIT: Listed price is in CAD, this is more like $1.2k in USD)
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Canadian suits me just fine lol that’s the 1541 successor right? I’m remembering now soekris did a refresh recently ish.
Has anyone heard a 2541?
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That is the successor. I owned one but didn’t have enough knowledge to assess it properly now.
Iirc many said it had better macro than the 1541?
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I would chase staging and tone/timbre over everything else as long as said dac isn’t harsh, bright, etc.
I love a lot about the border patrol but I can get past the imaging performance… I’ve heard much better and it’s pretty important to my enjoyment
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There’s a pontus II for 1575 on usaudiomart with shipping and fees. I think that’s good value
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I had one of those growing up! And the massive keyboard had a cartridge bay if you didn’t use a floppy.
I’ve also seen a couple of these on either side of $1500 lately
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Pretty sure @Hazi59 has one
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Indeed I do…but I haven’t heard the 1541, so I don’t know how it compares to that. But overall, the 2541 > V281 is one of my chains that I don’t plan on upgrading anytime soon. I am extremely happy with both pieces of gear.
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I wish I knew more about this dac. There’s one in Canada for much cheaper. Guy is selling the amp and dac but seems willing to let the dac go separately.
Here you go
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Mainly worried about impedance matching… comet has pretty low input impedance which is part of why I’ve concluded the border patrol isn’t ideal in my system 
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Personally I think the borderpatrol is a mess regardless of impedance properly matched or not, I think you are totally in the clear with the p6 in-between especially if you run balanced. It’s like a 100kohm input impedance for bal into the p6, the exogal is only like 1k output. It is nowhere near as high and unregulated as the borderpatrol is
@don actually I misread, looks like the output impedance in the 10s for the comet out, literally impossible to give you impedance issues. In comparison the border patrol can soar past 5k
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Okay great thanks for putting that worry to rest 
Does look like an interesting DAC
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Following a discussion with somebody on another forum wanted to ask the opinions here - do you think it’s possible to build a single chain that’ll get the most out of both the Susvara and 1266 or are they too different that they require different synergistic components to be at their best? We were discussing mainly amps and dacs
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Yes, but I don’t exactly know what get the most out of would be. I don’t think there’s a single chain that will fully play to all the strengths of both headphones, but I think there are chains that will maximize both in specific aspects but generally still favor one headphone over the other. All depends on what you are looking for imo
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This is absolutely the question, I prefer a somewhat thinner sound for the 1266, than I do the Susvara.
Having said that I like them both on the WA33, with the LaVoce S3 DAC, I preferred the 1266 on SS (Cavali LAu), but it wasn’t a clear win. Took some of the emphasis off the midrange, which I think isn’t the 1266’s strong suit.
With the NS1/Chord Dave, that preference swapped, and I preferred the WA33 for Both.
With my current DAC, I would probably also pick the WA33 over the Cavalli for both.
Generally the Susvara is the harder of the two to optimize for, but again it depends what you value when you listen.
@M0N and I probably have similar tastes, but when he had one he ran a different tube in his Pacific that I run in mine, and we both had sets of both tubes. Preferences vary, people value different aspects of reproduction over others.
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I think I’d also agree but I think that I do like a thicker sound for both, although I prefer much more bass thickness in the 1266 and midrange thickness in the susvara
I can see the value in both tube types, just basically came down to what I wanted to prioritize. Something else to consider is that we have fairly different cabling in our setups which also likely played a role
I’ll also mention that while we probably have similar ish tastes and priorities, @Polygonhell has a very different music library than I do lol
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That was really my point. and I agree I could have gone with either tube as well, but in my system I wanted to prioritize dynamics over a bit more stage and a tad more midrange body.
Yes our libraries are very different.
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