Help with burson conductor reference 3 dac/amp

[Elvis1118]

I’ll try to be quick and to the point.

I’ve only ever used the burson as a dac/amp for headphone listening and have never used any other features of it. Today I attempted to use it as a dac only and hooked the dac out on the Burson to one of the unused inputs on my AVR(Arcam AVR380) but I’m not getting any sound.

The chain I have is, Jriver is what I’m using to play all the music I have on a hard drive on a laptop. The burson is connected to the laptop via USB. I tried switching the cables, messing with settings in both Jriver and the burson itself ,nothings worked so far.

I wanted to post this to see if anybody had an idea of what I should try. I appreciate any help.

 

[lovinthehd]

Did you check input assignnment on the avr to see if the input you chose is setup for analog?

 

[Elvis1118]

Did you check input assignnment on the avr to see if the input you chose is setup for analog?

I did. It was actually something that slipped my mind at first until I saw an older thread where someone was having a similar issue and someone responded with checking the input, which I did immediately and it was set properly. I was kind of disappointed because I was kinda hoping that would be it lol

 

[TLS Guy]

I’ll try to be quick and to the point.

I’ve only ever used the burson as a dac/amp for headphone listening and have never used any other features of it. Today I attempted to use it as a dac only and hooked the dac out on the Burson to one of the unused inputs on my AVR(Arcam AVR380) but I’m not getting any sound.

The chain I have is, Jriver is what I’m using to play all the music I have on a hard drive on a laptop. The burson is connected to the laptop via USB. I tried switching the cables, messing with settings in both Jriver and the burson itself ,nothings worked so far.

I wanted to post this to see if anybody had an idea of what I should try. I appreciate any help.

The reason you have the issue is that you own a poorly designed overpriced idiotic piece of foolery. If you use a usual intern connect it apparently blows the output. Such a stupid arrangement is out of my experience. Apparently you need a transformer between the units.

Here is your user manual. Look at page 3.

To achieve an ideal sonic performance, the XLR outputs of the Conductor 3XR are direct coupling. ie. It has no coupling capacitors or transformers in the audio signal path. However, direct coupling outputs are NOT compatible with off-the-shelf XLR to RCA adaptors like the ones showing below. Never use these type of adaptors. Using such adaptors to connect the C3XR to any single-ended amplifier with RCA inputs will damage the internal opamps of the C3XR. Doing so will void the warranty. Therefore, to safely connect the Conductor 3XR to any single-ended amplifiers, please use the RCA output of the Conductor. The only adaptor that is permissible is the transformer type of adapters as shown below. (Neutrik NA2F-D0B-TX XLR to RCA Transformer Balancing Adapter)

The epitome of overpriced junk.

 

[Elvis1118]

The reason you have the issue is that you own a poorly designed overpriced idiotic piece of foolery. If you use a usual intern connect it apparently blows the output. Such a stupid arrangement is out of my experience. Apparently you need a transformer between the units.

Here is your user manual. Look at page 3.

To achieve an ideal sonic performance, the XLR outputs of the Conductor 3XR are direct coupling. ie. It has no coupling capacitors or transformers in the audio signal path. However, direct coupling outputs are NOT compatible with off-the-shelf XLR to RCA adaptors like the ones showing below. Never use these type of adaptors. Using such adaptors to connect the C3XR to any single-ended amplifier with RCA inputs will damage the internal opamps of the C3XR. Doing so will void the warranty. Therefore, to safely connect the Conductor 3XR to any single-ended amplifiers, please use the RCA output of the Conductor. The only adaptor that is permissible is the transformer type of adapters as shown below. (Neutrik NA2F-D0B-TX XLR to RCA Transformer Balancing Adapter)

The epitome of overpriced junk.

That must be a later revised version or something. The one I have doesn’t have any XLR at all.

 

[TLS Guy]

That must be a later revised version or something. The one I have doesn’t have any XLR at all.
View attachment 72557View attachment 72556

That is the manual that came up for me. Can you post a link to your manual here? Judging by the last manual and the utter nonsense that outfit was spouting, I expect your issue is something equally stupid or worse. A headphone amp does not need all that complexity. In fact a small simpler cheaper circuit would better.

 

[Elvis1118]

I kinda skimmed through it the other day and nothing jumped out at me, unless I just overlooked it.

https://sepeaaudio.com/content/Burson_Audio_Conductor_3_Reference_User_Manual_V1_2.pdf?srsltid=AfmBOopgSuWnFHN7cxR18Eqsx2av-cVN8RFSWWxnl5fTxYJH9z5SJo8_

 

[TLS Guy]

I kinda skimmed through it the other day and nothing jumped out at me, unless I just overlooked it.

https://sepeaaudio.com/content/Burson_Audio_Conductor_3_Reference_User_Manual_V1_2.pdf?srsltid=AfmBOopgSuWnFHN7cxR18Eqsx2av-cVN8RFSWWxnl5fTxYJH9z5SJo8_

You are right, the manual is of limited help . Use the DAC out to connect to your receiver, as that bypasses the volume control and will have the highest output. That outfit is full of nut jobs. They seem to think changing op.amps is some sort of acceptable tone control! If that connection does not work then that unit is as daft as it appears to be.

 

[Elvis1118]

You are right, the manual is of limited help . Use the DAC out to connect to your receiver, as that bypasses the volume control and will have the highest output. That outfit is full of nut jobs. They seem to think changing op.amps is some sort of acceptable tone control! If that connection does not work then that unit is as daft as it appears to be.

I agree. That op amp stuff is just nonsense. I probably wouldn’t have even got that amp had it not been for the fact it was open box and the guy was just trying to unload it. I didn’t pay anywhere near full price for it. I appreciate the help. It does seem like there’s something up at least with the dac out.

 

[TLS Guy]

I agree. That op amp stuff is just nonsense. I probably wouldn’t have even got that amp had it not been for the fact it was open box and the guy was just trying to unload it. I didn’t pay anywhere near full price for it. I appreciate the help. It does seem like there’s something up at least with the dac out.

In that case use the other one off the volume control and turn the volume up. See if that works.

I can see why you were tempted to buy that, but you should not take up deals that look too good to be true, as that is usually the case. If neither of those outputs work, then I suspect you now know why it was dirt cheap and open box.