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On other forums there seem to be only two sides: The one half says this is snakeoil and the other half says that you shouldnt buy anything else... I haven´t heard multibit yet, so I can´t tell but the explanations don´t make much sense to me. It's not that polarized- there's the sensible middle ground of those who say try both, choose the one you prefer the sound of. It's also no just multibit vs DS. It's also down to specific models of DAC.
Does Multibit actually sound better?
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keyboard_arrow_downJdub11
26
May 27, 2020
I've had the Mimby for about 2 years now and since it was my first Dac I had nothing to compare it to until I got the EL Dac then the D50s. For a while I thought the EL and D50s were so much better because to me they sounded much better than the Mimby and I even put it away. Recently I got it back out to see if I still didn't care for it and surprisingly I started to like it again.
What I think it is is the fact that it sounds really bad with recordings that aren't the best unlike the other 2 Dacs which sound much cleaner with bad recordings. If I use music that's recorded and mastered very well on the Mimby it sounds very good but with lesser recordings it can sound quite bad.
I still think the EL and D50s are overall better Dacs because they sound good with pretty much everything I put through them but with the right recordings the Mimby can sound really good.
dcha12
464
May 5, 2020
Multibit is Schiit's hybrid R2R/2R resistor-ladder DAC design. The big point with Schiit's implementation is the digital filtering at the end, which does not use an approximation and instead calculates exact sums to produce the analog signal. It also guarantees monotonicity, a great upside. A huge downside is design complexity; they require 2^n parts, so going beyond a handful a bits is unfeasible if you still want to keep it within reasonable bounds (this is why the multibit stuff is more expensive).
To answer whether or not it's "better," you'll have to listen to both yourself and make a call. It's more about total component synergy; on these PAP Trio speakers powered by a Vidar, the delta-sigma Gungnir was a better match than the Gungnir Multibit. This shouldn't be a surprise; the newer Gungnir Multibits can tend towards sounding lean and needs a warm amp and transducer pairing, the delta-sigma one is warmer-sounding. So on that system, tonally the delta-sigma was better.
In fact, I wouldn't really consider the delta-sigma versions and the multibit versions of the same DAC to be of the same type; they're really different DACs and topologies in the same box with the same name. The differences are not subtle.
The Schiit Multibit has a hint of the old R2R sound; good tone density, a hint of the syrupy liquidity, and a small amount of romanticism. However, they really are highly resolving; they edge out other chips in this regard (some well-implemented delta-sigma DACs come close or are on-par depending on implementation and analog sections). Whether or not you'll like the sound....well it's up to personal preference.
Personally, I like the Schiit multibit stuff, but I actually like the Matrix X-Sabre Pro better and that's what I'm running in my system.
wofse
123
Apr 20, 2020
I bought a Fiio M11 which seems to solve the issue by sounding great and I run it thru Schiits 99$ amp called Modi+ and I bought their Loki equalizer to tweak the sound. I’m more then satisfied AND it only took 4 days to arrive! They also give you a 14 day return policy if you are unhappy ...
NotABot
426
Nov 15, 2019
On other forums there seem to be only two sides: The one half says this is snakeoil and the other half says that you shouldnt buy anything else... I haven´t heard multibit yet, so I can´t tell but the explanations don´t make much sense to me. It's not that polarized- there's the sensible middle ground of those who say try both, choose the one you prefer the sound of. It's also no just multibit vs DS. It's also down to specific models of DAC.
(Edited)
A community member
Nov 14, 2019
Schiit Modi Multibit is total failure, I just wasted money. Lacks dynamics, micro detail, sounds overly warm and indistinct with narrow stage. I was tempted to buy it because of great quality of their other products I own, Magni and Vali amps.
ElectronicVices
2940
May 28, 2020
Many of the electronics companies recommend leaving your device on, some even went so far as to not include standby/power switch in the design. I know this is new to you but it's fairly known in the community R2R should be left on for best results.
A community member
May 28, 2020
ElectronicVicesI wish electronics companies just tell this in a manual. It would make life much simpler.
samhith
49
Mar 31, 2018
Schit multibit hardly resolves 8 bits of audio it's garbage get A topping instead
jaydunndiddit
3263
Mar 16, 2019
Yeah, but not through a DAC. You can achieve that via filters, a tube amp, tube buffer, etc., not 2nd or 3rd order distortion from a crappy DAC that measures poorly.
A DAC is only as good as the signal it processes. Garbage in = Garbage out. It doesn't get more basic than that.
motocrossman24
19
May 4, 2020
samhithLmao...you realize that delta sigma dacs only process 1 bit of audio right? That’s the entire reason for a multibit dac, you get the actual bits, not guess work and filtering.
WongWay
65
Mar 30, 2018
Having owned a Schiit Modi Multibit (Aka Mimby) and now a Cambridge Audio Dac Magic Plus. From what I can hear, The Mimby has a very relax and slightly dark signature to it, having upgraded to the Dacmagic Plus I find this to be a lot more resolving and offers better layering. The Mimby simply can't beat my Dacmagic in detail and sounded muddy in comparison. I ended up selling the Mimby simply because of that.
How I see it is if you want a relaxing sound the Mimby is the way to go but at the expense of some details (IMO defeats the purpose of a Dac). And also you do have to leave the Mimby on for at least a few hours/days for it to sound at its best which wasn't ideal for me. Sorry couldn't give you a modi 2 impression but hope this helps.
P.S. If you are getting the Modi 2, please go for the Uber variant to avoid USB jitters.
How I see it is if you want a relaxing sound the Mimby is the way to go but at the expense of some details (IMO defeats the purpose of a Dac). And also you do have to leave the Mimby on for at least a few hours/days for it to sound at its best which wasn't ideal for me. Sorry couldn't give you a modi 2 impression but hope this helps.
P.S. If you are getting the Modi 2, please go for the Uber variant to avoid USB jitters.
Onslash
166
Feb 26, 2021
Cferrer1983A linear power supply. As opposed to most wall warts which are switching power supply.
BetaWar
193
Mar 27, 2018
I have the Modi 2 multibit, and admittedly haven't heard the standard/ uber versions, so I can't (and won't) be trying to compare them. However, I can at least try to explain the difference between the standard (and uber), and the multibit and why it is "better" (quotes because it is subjective and based on personal preference like so many other things in the audio world).
DACs come with a specific number of "steps" that they can break a digital signal up in to. This will likely vary depending on the DAC that you are looking at, but for these purposes I am going to state that 16 is the "standard" (may be completely incorrect). That would mean that a digital signal sent from your source has 16 bits of precision. Typically speaking the more precision a value has the better it can be represented... but that is a simplification because it really depends on the type of number, etc. For instance a floating point number (number capable of storing a decimal value instead of just an integer) can have varying mantissas associated with them to give different values to the power section or the integer section of the number at hand, while an integer can only count by whole numbers (so 1, 2, 3, etc.). Either way, the more bits a digital number has access to the more values can be represented by it.
For example, a 16-bit digital value can store 2^16 different values ranging between 32,768 and -32,767 (0 is counted as a value, so positive or negative has 1 fewer possible values than the other... I can't remember which at the moment, so I chose negative arbitrarily. It is probably wrong, so if you really care I suggest googling it). This gives you a total of 65536 "steps" that can be represented in the sound wave from the digital signal. This also means that when you are converting the signal to analogue there will be only so many different values that can be represented.
Now, when looking at the multibit, it supports 24 bits of resolution. That means all of the sudden instead of having 65536 total values that the digital number can represent to the DAC, it can represent 2^24 total values (16777216) which is significantly more than a 16-bit value can represent. This means that the analogue graph _can_ (not necessarily _will_) have more "stairs" in it and be a smoother transition since each of the steps is smaller.
Basically what it comes down to is the more values your DAC is capable of converting from digital to analogue, the smoother the sound wave your DAC is able to output to your amp and subsequently your headphones/ speakers. Sorry, that last sentence sounds horrible, but I also haven't come up with a way I like better, so it stuck.
One other thing to keep in mind is that depending on the audio files you have access to and how they were recorded, they may have more or fewer bits available than your DAC can handle, so it is possible that you won't notice a difference because your music doesn't actually have a difference encoded within it. Likewise, having a 32-bit or 64-bit DAC would be even better than a 24-bit DAC, but most music has nowhere near that many bits of resolution at this point, so it would be a significant waste to get a DAC with the resolution since it would never be used (as of now).
I am not sure how well I stated that, but hopefully it gives you some insights.
DACs come with a specific number of "steps" that they can break a digital signal up in to. This will likely vary depending on the DAC that you are looking at, but for these purposes I am going to state that 16 is the "standard" (may be completely incorrect). That would mean that a digital signal sent from your source has 16 bits of precision. Typically speaking the more precision a value has the better it can be represented... but that is a simplification because it really depends on the type of number, etc. For instance a floating point number (number capable of storing a decimal value instead of just an integer) can have varying mantissas associated with them to give different values to the power section or the integer section of the number at hand, while an integer can only count by whole numbers (so 1, 2, 3, etc.). Either way, the more bits a digital number has access to the more values can be represented by it.
For example, a 16-bit digital value can store 2^16 different values ranging between 32,768 and -32,767 (0 is counted as a value, so positive or negative has 1 fewer possible values than the other... I can't remember which at the moment, so I chose negative arbitrarily. It is probably wrong, so if you really care I suggest googling it). This gives you a total of 65536 "steps" that can be represented in the sound wave from the digital signal. This also means that when you are converting the signal to analogue there will be only so many different values that can be represented.
Now, when looking at the multibit, it supports 24 bits of resolution. That means all of the sudden instead of having 65536 total values that the digital number can represent to the DAC, it can represent 2^24 total values (16777216) which is significantly more than a 16-bit value can represent. This means that the analogue graph _can_ (not necessarily _will_) have more "stairs" in it and be a smoother transition since each of the steps is smaller.
Basically what it comes down to is the more values your DAC is capable of converting from digital to analogue, the smoother the sound wave your DAC is able to output to your amp and subsequently your headphones/ speakers. Sorry, that last sentence sounds horrible, but I also haven't come up with a way I like better, so it stuck.
One other thing to keep in mind is that depending on the audio files you have access to and how they were recorded, they may have more or fewer bits available than your DAC can handle, so it is possible that you won't notice a difference because your music doesn't actually have a difference encoded within it. Likewise, having a 32-bit or 64-bit DAC would be even better than a 24-bit DAC, but most music has nowhere near that many bits of resolution at this point, so it would be a significant waste to get a DAC with the resolution since it would never be used (as of now).
I am not sure how well I stated that, but hopefully it gives you some insights.
Juka
196
Mar 27, 2018
Schiit runs a blog detailing the design process of the Yggdrasil as well as what makes it different:
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/schiit-happened-the-story-of-the-worlds-most-improbable-start-up.701900/
The details of the tech is in one of the chapter but totally forgot which ones as it has been about 2-3 years since I read the earlier chapters.
you may want to also dig on a username "baldr" post in his blog as he is the designer of the DACs (Mike Moffat).
The details of the tech is in one of the chapter but totally forgot which ones as it has been about 2-3 years since I read the earlier chapters.
you may want to also dig on a username "baldr" post in his blog as he is the designer of the DACs (Mike Moffat).
ElectronicVices
2940
Apr 2, 2018
Multi-bit doesn't discard the original samples... nothing that comes out of a D/S is the "same" as what went in (they are all recreations). Whether or not this actually has bearing on the sound is up for debate but the discarding of the original samples is what Mike Moffat dislikes about D/S DAC chips.
Juka
196
Mar 27, 2018
Those are subjective terms, body and naturalness can mean totally different things from one person to the next.
There is a real difference in measurements which IMO is enough to justify the higher price point.
There is a real difference in measurements which IMO is enough to justify the higher price point.
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On other forums there seem to be only two sides: The one half says this is snakeoil and the other half says that you shouldnt buy anything else... I haven´t heard multibit yet, so I can´t tell but the explanations don´t make much sense to me.
Do you guys have heard a difference with one specific model (like Modi 2 and Modi Multibit) or at least know what exactly it does?