Which Dacs should I be considering? - Page 2

Can highly recommend an Audio-GD Dac3SE.  Simple, well built, only SPDIF - BNC & RCA, warm sounding but closer to neutral than 'warm' , awesome bass control and punch.  I've got one recently and its done around 170hrs and still burning in,but very happy with the sound.  I have an Oppo 83SE and the sound is quite neutral and gets clinical at times with my tube amp and speakers, but the DAC3 just does so much more in bringing in the warmth to cd's.

I wanted to get the Reference 9 with the DSP-1 unit, but couldnt stretch the budget that far considering how poor the aussie dollar was at that time.  But no regrets though, if partner it with a good low jitter source, the sound is fantastic for $$ paid.

I don't really buy it when people say an SS device sounds like tubes, they usually mean that it sounds warm and not analytical or bright but it wont sound like tubes, tubes just have a much  more realistic sound , btw my xindak has a tube output and an SS (solid state) output. the SS is driven by an opamp like a regular dac and the tube has a tube driver at  the  output , the tube side sounds alot nicer.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kawai_man 

I don't really buy it when people say an SS device sounds like tubes, they usually mean that it sounds warm and not analytical or bright but it wont sound like tubes, tubes just have a much  more realistic sound , btw my xindak has a tube output and an SS (solid state) output. the SS is driven by an opamp like a regular dac and the tube has a tube driver at  the  output , the tube side sounds alot nicer.

Well said.

The only DAC that I find very very interesting at that price point is the Audio-GD DAC19DSP.  Incidently, I have one on order.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Headphony 

The only DAC that I find very very interesting at that price point is the Audio-GD DAC19DSP.  Incidently, I have one on order.

I'm really interested to see how it compares to the 'Big 4' in your gear list even though it is SE.

Hope you share your findings with us.

 

All this talk about the ECD-1

Why not just go for the Abrahamsen V6.0

I have had the Bel Canto DAC2 and whilst it was OK the V6.0 is far superior

Xindak DAC-5 and YBA Design wd202 are both available in your price range if you can find a used model, and both sounded really great. I've heard good things about the Yulong D100 and the AudioGD DAC3 as well. Lots of great choices in your price range.

How about the modified Music Hall DAC 25.2 that I have seen on Audiogon?

http://www.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?dgtlconv&1281919421&/Music-Hall-DAC-25.2