He’s finally responding to my emails and it is taking everything I’ve got not to fucking unload on him. For starters, he seems to only read about 25% of what I send to him. I repeatedly said I tried multiple computers and cables.
First response:
Sounds like a bad connection, bad cable, or dirt in the connector.
It is most certianly not part of the burn in process.
It is something FEEDING the DAC not something inside of the DAC.
Yes, it has to be outside of the DAC. That’s why multiple computers and cables all result in the same thing. And yes, I’ve checked the cables, ports, and etc. There’s no dirt. It’s a brand new DAC and a brand new cable. Plus, I used an old cable I know for certain does work as well.
Follow-up reply:
I don’t know how you may have done it, but it is possible that you blew the DAC chip or the output stage.
Rare but it does happen.
It has never happened the first day a person owned one of our DACs…usually from a lightning strike or power surge that blew out other electronics in their home.
Are you certain that you powered on the DAC before booting up the MacBook?
Are you certain that everything else is correctly set up with the MacBook to play music through the DAC (DAC selected, volume 100%, etc)?
Even then, I would recommend powering everything down overnight and then starting fresh tomorrow.
First power on the DAC.
Then power on your MacBook.
Then check all the settings to make sure everything is correct.
And even try more than one player software, such as iTunes in addition to Roon.
AMAZING that he is straight up BLAMING ME. I guess yeah, it’s my fault. I plugged it in and fed it a signal. Shouldn’t have done that if I didn’t want any chance of it failing. What the FUCK? It’s possible for things to happen without it being anyone’s fault, but definitely blame the customer. No possible way that could backfire, right?
So, summoning as much patience as I could, I responded with this:
I’ve tried Roon and Spotify. I dont use iTunes. And the Mystique has been powered on the entire time outside of the few power cycles I’ve done. I don’t know how I could’ve done anything when all I did was plug it in and feed it a signal.
I jiggled the USB cable a little bit just now and it sounds like there is a signal very sporadically and it’s very faint. It only lasts a brief moment and I can’t easily reproduce it, but it’s happened a few times.
I had something similar happen a few years back with an MDHT Labs DAC where I was listening and there was a huge static burst and then all audio was lost except for a very faint, staticky signal.
I sent it in and it turned out a solder point had come undone, it took about 5 minutes to fix, and they had it back on its way to me the next day after testing it.
I’ve blown out my fair share of devices and this has none of those signs. There was no pop or smell of burning electricity. It continues to power up and be recognized by every computer I attach it to, and now with the faint signal being heard depending on how I slightly move the cable, it seems like this might be the case. Is that a possibility?
And am awaiting his next, accusatory response that suggests additional things I’ve already told him I’ve tried, while continuing to blame me. And the more I think about it, the more it makes sense that it would be my fault, and not the fault of the person putting the electronic device together. There’s only one way to use it and I still did that wrong, of course, because you can only insert the cables one way, so it’s on me. Not a build issue. Never a build issue. No possible fucking WAY it’s a build issue.
Fuck me, man. 100% my fault. I shouldn’t have bought this. It’s been cursed from the start. The universe just keeps letting me know every step of the way that I shouldn’t have done it. Amazing.