Nagra hd x DAC
The power supply is extremely sophisticated, using ultra-fast silicon carbide rectifier diodes, ultra-low-noise voltage regulators, and a virtual battery made up of a supercapacitor bank three times larger than the one in the HD Preamp. The new HD DAC X includes no fewer than 37 regulated ultra-low-noise individual power supplies. The HD DAC X features AES-EBU, S/P-DIF on both RCA and BNC and 2x Nagra Link single-mode ST-1 optical inputs to receive future Nagra high resolution sources. The USB input uses a proprietary software designed around an 8-core X-Mos chip. Ultra-high precision and ultra-low jitter clocks are used in this new Nagra HD DAC X. A high-performance FPGA performs all internal calculations. Every input signal is converted into DSD 256 format (11.2 MHz sample rate).
The main digital power supply has a noise level 30 times lower than the HD DAC, itself already using very low-noise circuits. The order of magnitude of the noise of these new power supplies is 0.4 to 0.8 µV rms (from 10 Hz to 100 kHz). The digital part alone uses 16 ultra-low-noise power supplies. The digital input and D/A board is built on an 8-layer, high-precision PCB. The analog section is quite unique. The proven solutions adopted for the Nagra HD DAC have been retained and improved. Like the HD PREAMP, it uses a dual-mono topology. The analog signal coming out of the D/A board is taken to a symmetrical current amplifier that dramatically lowers its impedance. This unique stage reaches astonishing performance levels with a rise time in the order of 1800 V / µS into the 28 H inductive load of the inter-stage transformers. It makes no use of feedback nor does it provide any gain.