Demograf Audio Hyperion vs Rockna Wavedream: an owner’s comparison

In June 2022 an owner, Maksim, spent an intensive listening session comparing a Demograf Audio converter on the Cirrus Logic CS4397 chip, with an AL4 tube output stage, against a Rockna Wavedream DAC. The Demograf Audio unit was an earlier build on the same chip and output tube that the Hyperion offers today. His report is short, but it is direct about the strengths of both DACs and about one reservation that he applies to every Demograf Audio CS4397 DAC he has heard. Below we summarise it, and set it beside what other owners have said on the same point.

These impressions are summarised and translated from owners’ posts on an audiophile forum. They are the subjective views of their authors, not measurements or claims of Demograf Audio.

Sound, range by range

Bass

• The Demograf Audio DAC was noticeably more interesting in the bass.

Drums and dynamics

• More dynamic and more precise, with every drum more distinct and punchier.

Midrange

• Somewhat emptier in the midrange than the Rockna. He notes that he hears this in all the Demograf Audio DACs on the CS4397.
• The Rockna’s midrange was more pleasant to him.

Resolution

• The Rockna was slightly ahead, but he found the difference in resolution very small.

Compared with the Rockna Wavedream

Overall he heard the Rockna Wavedream as the more mature and more universal of the two, with a more pleasant midrange and slightly higher resolution. It also plays metal superbly in its own way: he singles out its wonderfully raw, garage-like guitars.

Even so, he would choose the Demograf Audio DAC for its bass, dynamics and drums. To him it simply gives more emotion, and on metal it plays with noticeably more bite and, in his view, better.

The midrange: what other owners report

The midrange is where owners of Demograf Audio CS4397 DACs differ most, and their systems differ too. In a blind comparison with the Lampizator Golden Gate II, one listener likewise found the Demograf Audio DAC cooler and more reserved in the midrange than the Lampizator, while another described it as warm, if less warm than its rival. In a comparison with the dCS Debussy, an owner heard the opposite: a slight, warm colouring of the midrange, which almost disappeared with better cables and after warm-up. An owner who moved to it from a NAD M51 found that the DAC adds nothing of its own.

The output tube is one variable among several. The DAC in this comparison used AL4 tubes, while most of the other units mentioned here used EL8. The Hyperion is built with either, or with a solid-state output stage, and the choice is agreed before the build starts.

Summary

In this owner’s comparison the Rockna Wavedream was the more mature and universal DAC, with a more pleasant midrange and slightly higher resolution. The Demograf Audio CS4397 DAC with AL4 output was more engaging in the bass, more dynamic and punchier on drums, and his choice for metal. He found the gap in resolution very small.

Which Demograf Audio piece fits

• Hyperion is the current Demograf Audio DAC on the Cirrus Logic CS4397. It takes USB (Amanero) up to 24-bit / 192 kHz and DSD256 as well as S/PDIF coaxial. The stock output stage is solid-state; a tube output stage, EL8 and AL4 among the options, can be fitted to order. More owners’ impressions are in our Hyperion owners’ reviews.
• The Reference Tube DAC is the classic-chip alternative, built in five versions named after their chips: Calliope (TDA1540), Persephone (TDA1541), Aphrodite (TDA1547), Artemis (PCM63) and Katerina (PCM1704). Owners describe the TDA1547 in particular as having a singing midrange; see our owners’ comparison of DAC chips by ear.

Every Demograf Audio converter is made by Dmitriy Gubchenko. Each is made to order and covered by a one-year warranty (extra warranty available: +1 or +2 years). If you are unsure which output stage suits your system, write to us with your amplifier, loudspeakers and the music you play most.