 A month ago I reviewed the Denafrips Gaia Digital to Digital converter using the Terminator Plus DAC from the same company. I got several requests to test the Gaia with more affordable DACs, so here we go. Let's start with a recap on what the Gaia does, for that appeared to be unclear to many. In layman's terms the Gaia cleans up the digital audio signal in such a way that it is much easier for a DAC to interpret. So it's not about preventing to lose bits, nor about upsampling. It just cleans up the analog square waves in which the digital information is stored. And, using a very high quality clock generator, it makes sure the timing of the signal is as good as possible. Against popular belief, a buffer in the DAC doesn't necessarily solve all problems. Offering the DAC a cleaner signal does, unless the source or the DAC has the same circuit integrated as the Gaia has, of course. Which seldom is the case by the way. For a full description see the first review of the Gaia. It is to be connected between the digital to analog converter in your stereo and the digital source or sources. So, when you play directly from your computer or laptop to your DAC, you now connect your computer to the Gaia, preferably over USB, but speedup or tosslink are also available. The output of your DAC is to be connected to your DAC or amplifier with built-in DAC over preferably I2S, since that does the highest sampling rate. If your DAC doesn't have a compatible I2S input, you can use speedup, tosslink or AES-EBU. Both on the input and on the output side, the use of speedup, tosslink or AES-EBU limits the sampling frequency to 192 kHz PCM and DSD64. Using USB in and I2S out allows for sampling rates up to 768 kHz PCM and DSD512. If you use a network player or network bridge, the same rules for input and output apply of course. It has to be connected to your router over a network cable or Wi-Fi. You can then play music from internet radio stations and streaming services like Tidal, Koguz or at lower quality Spotify and others. Music on your computer can also be accessed over the network as can the music on a NAS. In both cases you have to use audio player software that is compatible with your network player or bridge and usually make the volume holding the music available to your network. Since the Gaia has four digital inputs, you can use four digital sources in total. So next to a computer or network player, for instance a CD player over speedup or AES-EBU and a television over tosslink. You can select a source using buttons on the front. There is no remote control. You ask me to investigate if the Gaia is beneficiary to less expensive DACs. There are many ways you can go about this but I decided to use my setup one so eliminating the variable called the rest of the stereo. I used two DACs that might take Brooklyn powered by the Ferrum-Hipsis power supply and the Denafrips Ares II used in my setup two. The Brooklyn-Hipsis combination costs around €3,000, the Ares II around €900. I also used two digital sources, the Euralic Ares G2 costing about €4,600 and the Hi-Fi Berry Digi Plus Pro Spiddiff board on the Raspberry Pi 3B and powered from a cheap switch mode power supply costing around €70. The Ares G2 outputs a very clean splitter signal while the Digi Plus Pro powered from that L cheaper power supply outputs a far less perfect signal but still good enough for the top of my setup three. The center of my setup one is the AIR AX520 amplifier connected to the AudioPhysics Scorpio loudspeakers over AudioQuest Robinhood Zero loudspeaker cables. The analog cables were Grimm Audio SQM and the Spiddiff cables were older Fenderhull Videolink 75 ohm RCA's. Both the Ares G2 and the Hi-Fi Berry Digi Plus Pro were connected to the Ether-Region switch over an AudioQuest Diamond CAT7 Ethernet cable and both ran as Roon Endpoint. The Ares G2 offers that next to their own streaming protocol. The Raspberry Pi 3B with Hi-Fi Berry Digi Plus Pro ran Ruby software that made it a Roon Endpoint. Roon Server ran on an Intel NUC10i7FNH with 8 TB SSD music storage, which is placed on the third floor. It was connected to the Ether-Region as described in my video about my reference setup November 2020. Playback was controlled over an iPad Pro running the Roon amp. To sum up the four setups, number one. The AIR amp and AudioPhysics speakers, the MiTech Brooklyn DAC with Farron Hipser's power supply, the Ares G2 Streamer and the Uptone Audio Ether-Region switch and of course the Gaia. Two, the same setup but with the Denafrips Ares II instead of the MiTech. Three, the same as in one but with the Ares G2 replaced by the Hi-Fi Berry Digi Plus Pro Network Bridge. And four, the same as three but with the Ares II as DAC. Let's start with the MiTech and Ares combo. When the Gaia was inserted, the timbre shifted a bit to the brighter side, which surprised me. The stereo image got somewhat deeper, though not whiner. The mid-range resolution was a bit better, as was the sibilance control. I'm not sure I liked the timbre shift, for the rest it gave limited improvements. When using the Gaia in combination with the Ares II, there was no timbre change while furthermore the same improvement shows, only a bit less clear. Using the MiTech Hipsers and the Digi Plus Pro, the Gaia gave clearly more improvement. This time no timbre change. The stereo image gained clearly depth and width. There was a clear resolution improvement, especially in the mid-range and a clear improvement in sibilance control. Mind you, this is comparing the Digi Plus Pro signal with and without the Gaia. It is not a comparison with the Ares G2 as source. Then the Digi Plus Pro with the Ares II. Here again some improvement, but less clear with the exception of the sibilance control that clearly improved. It's safe to say that the Gaia gave improvement, in some cases more than others. The biggest improvement came with the MiTech and Digi Plus Pro combination. And that makes sense, when combined with the Ares G2 the incoming digital signal was already of rather high quality. The Digi Plus Pro deliberately powered from a cheap power supply to get a mediocre digital signal gave a signal to the Gaia that it could easily improve. It was also clear that a better DAC was able to produce better analog sound quality than a good DAC and that differences in digital signal on the input became more apparent. But what's to conclude? Should I buy the Gaia for the Brooklyn Hipsers combination? It depends on what source I would have and how the MiTech is used. It can function as an analog and digital pre-amplifier and even be a phono pre-amp. If you use it like that I would certainly consider the Gaia. My son uses the Brooklyn like that, while I just use it as a DAC. In the latter case I would rather invest money in, for instance, the Danofrips Venus II and try to sell the Brooklyn and Hipsers. If I didn't already have the Brooklyn, I would certainly spend the money on a class-better DAC than buying the cheaper DAC and the Gaia. You could always buy the Gaia later on, for on DACs of a higher class, the improvement is rather clear. It also depends on the digital source. In my setup 1 I play over the Aurelic AirSG2 that, as said, outputs a high quality digital signal. In my setup 2, where the air is normally used, the digital source is the LOUS bridge signature that performs very good given its price. But here I would rather spend money on an SOTM SMS-200 Ultra than on a Gaia. So, in short, I would rather spend money on a better digital source and a DAC than on the Gaia. But having a better source and DAC, the Gaia will bring you further improvement as you can see in the first review. Some last three marks. For this review I had to use equipment that I have available. I only keep equipment that I consider to be best in class. Mistreating, for instance, the HiFiBerry DigiPlus Pro by using a very cheap power supply might give the wrong impression of that product. Therefore, there is a link to reviews of all equipment I use in this review. So you can get a good impression of these products. Which brings us to the end of this video. But know there will be a new video next Friday at 5pm CET. If you don't want to miss that, subscribe to this channel or follow me on the social media so you will be informed when new videos are out. Help me to grow the channel further by giving this video a thumb up or share it on the social media. Many thanks to those viewers that support the channel financially. It keeps me independent and enables further improvement of the channel. All donated money is invested back into the channel. If that makes you feel like supporting my work too, the links are in the comments below this video on YouTube. I'm Hans Beekhuyzen, thank you for watching and see you in the next show or on theHBproject.com. Have whatever you do, enjoy the music.