BorderPatrol DAC SE USB + SPDIF Review; Something Special for Digital Audio Playback

I have spent a lot of time listening to this BorderPatrol DAC SE USB + SPDIF at audio shows, reading what other reviewers that I respect say about it and it has been the source in two of the rooms that earned Beatnik Bongo Awards at recent shows. So, I decided to ask Gary Dews, the guy behind BorderPatrol, if he could send me one to review. Now that I have listened to this DAC for almost two months in my system, I understand what all of the fuss is about.

Description

This DAC is very compact, just 9 by 7 by 3 inches and weighs only 6 pounds. Still, it feels very well built. The chassis is made of copper, Gary’s preferred chassis material for best sound. The BorderPatrol DAC also uses an “old-timey” R2R DAC chip (Phillips TDA1543) with no over-sampling (NOS), no up-sampling, no digital filtering and no output buffering. The USB/SPDIF chips are I2S coupled directly to the DAC chip and the output is directly from the chip by way of discrete film and foil capacitors. All BorderPatrol products, which include a line of tube amplifiers and preamps, are hand-crafted in Waldorf, MD. And, for quality control, Gary, who not only owns the company but also designed the DAC, listens to and tests each one before they are shipped out.

A blue-ringed pushbutton on the front panel of the DAC enables the user to select whether the tube is in or out of the DAC’s power supply. The power switch is on the rear panel. Also on the rear panel is the fuse-protected 15A IEC socket and a single switch to select either the USB or SPDIF inputs. There’s also a set of gold RCA outputs on the rear panel. There’s also a horizontal opening for the tube located on the left side of the top plate near the front.

It wouldn’t be a Gary Dews design without a power supply that’s something special. This DAC uses his choke input filter design. The SE version has a twin transformer power supply system as used in his EXS amplifier PSU’s, as well as an ELNA Cerafine power supply capacitor and film and foil signal coupling capacitors.

Review System

I used this DAC exclusively in my reference system. While I have lots of CDs, most of them are packed up, so I decided to get a transport to use with it. I called Yoshi Segoshi of Sakura Systems and asked him to loan me a 47 Labs Midnight Blue CD player to use as a transport.

I had reviewed this player for Dagogo, and I really liked it. I remembered that it uses a very good TEAC transport, and for the player, it uses the same TDA1543 chipset as the BorderPatrol. It’s also a non-oversampling DAC. I had really liked this CD player, and I wanted to have it in to compare with the BorderPatrol.

The rest of the review system included my MacBook Pro with music from our home server with an Emia Remote Autoformer as the line stage, the LTA Ultralinear power amplifier and my Teresonic XR speakers.

Listening to Music

On the BorderPatrol website, they say, “Natural, sweet, open and organic are not words usually used to describe digital electronics but those were the design goals for the BorderPatrol DAC……The most natural sounding DAC’s are usually NOS (no over-sampling) designs based around the R-2R resistor ladder chips with no digital filtering. When carefully implemented, designs like this can sound refreshingly natural and organic.” 

My experience says this is a pretty accurate assessment of digital audio playback with a few exceptions. The exceptions I have encountered have been certain SACD and DSD digital sources and the Aesthetix Romulus DAC and CD Transport.

This little BorderPatrol DAC is a stunning success when it comes to achieving the design goals of sounding natural, sweet, open and organic. If you quit listening critically and just enjoy the performance, I think like me, you will discover that this DAC allows for a degree of emotional involvement that you just don’t get from even some of the most expensive digital devices.

So, let’s talk about the listening experience. I started with CDs and compared it to the 47 Labs Midnight Blue’s built-in DAC. This comparison wasn’t as close as I had expected it to be. While I really liked the Midnight Blue player when I reviewed it, by comparison, it was boring and loose in the bass. The BorderPatrol went deeper and was tighter, but not too tight. The BorderPatrol DAC was also much more refined in the midrange and top-end. It had better scale and much better dynamics and micro-dynamics.

Next, I listened to the BorderPatrol DAC using the transport of the Aesthetix Romulus DAC and CD Transport. There was an even bigger difference; the top-end and midrange opened up and were more transparent. The overall sound was as if the window on the performance had been opened. I was equally impressed that it easily bettered my Electrocompaniet USB DAC.

I expect you’re asking why I care about a DAC that costs between $995 and $1,850 that doesn’t play DSD or High Rez files? The reason is simply that it is much better than most of those that do, and nothing comes close for anywhere near its price. If you just want to listen and be emotionally involved in a musical performance, it is hard to beat the BorderPatrol DAC SE without spending a fortune.

Conclusion

This little DAC is something very special. I should mention that I did all of my listening with the tube in the circuit. I thought it lost some of its magic without it. If you want to enjoy music, this DAC will let you. Highly recommended!