New soundcard or upgrade DAC?

[Apocalypsee]

Hello all, I need some advice here.

I have X-Fi XtremeMusic currently, my internal X-Fi analog circuit is kaput because of excessive modding, so I can't use them no more, thankfully the digital out is still functional, so I feed to an external Yulong PCM58DAC, as the name implies, its based on old Burr Brown PCM58 DAC. It sounded great, but its an old DAC, and it can't compare to the internal DAC in the soundcard, even though the external one is a lot lower noise floor

My question is, should I buy another more modern DAC or should I buy a new soundcard? My budget is limited, I can get ASUS Xonar D2, M-Audio Audiophile 192 (2nd hand), and Echo Mia Midi (2nd hand) for about similar prices. But for similar price, I can get the famous ZERO DAC, but I don't need extras like headphone and all, plus I don't like to have more stuff on my desk and eating another power plug

So which one is better? Get a proper soundcard or just buy a newer DAC?

[jenneth]

My roommate received his Claro Halo yesterday, and I spent a little time with that sound card last night. Personally, I think Halo is a very nice card, I used his EMP with my CD3K, and that combo sounded great; good sound stage/detail, fast attack, and transparent. Should you get a dedicated DAC? I don't know, but what I do know is that I like what I heard last night. He's going to change the op-amps soon, so it should sound even better than what it is now.

[Apocalypsee]

Hmm...the Claro Halo is indeed look like a good card, and I like the RCA out that it offers, but I didn't expect it to be cheap on my country, and God knows how long that card will arrive

Anyone have anymore experience, whether I should go for new soundcard or new DAC?

There is someone selling his NOS TDA1545 in my country which is similar to diyparadise complete with asynchronous reclocker which prices same as above soundcard and DAC I mention above (around RM500). Should I get that?