[proglife]

First, I have an Airport Express and a lower end Sony disc changer in the same setup. I would like to hook both up to a decent DAC; the APX via it's optical out and the Sony via it's coaxial output.

Can I get a single external DAC with both coax and optical inputs and use it for both the Sony and the APX? Will it recognize which player input is receiving data and automatically convert that stream to analog? I imagine this is different on case to case basis, but is that sort of thing common? Would it make more sense to buy a unit with an input switching control and just select the input as necessary?

Second question: I'd like something that sounds ANYTHING like my Rega P3. I've had 50 dollar DVD players and 1400 dollar redbook players in my system and nothing sounds anywhere close to as good as the Rega. What sort of DAC flavor should I be looking at when trying to get this sound out of my digital front end? NOS? Upsampling? Tube output? And of course, the cheaper the better

Thanks!

 

[Garbz]

No DAC I know sounds like a P3. The closest I've come to the wonderful tonality of mine was a borrowed NAIM CD2x, but at $5000 and not being a DAC it's not all that useful in this case.

Pretty much all DACs have multiple inputs one being coax and at least one optical. They usually aren't auto sensing but they do have an input selector at the front.

 

[granodemostasa]

the only dac off the top of my head is the wavelenght consecant (if i spelled that correctly). but it's only got 1 usb input.

 

[proglife]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Garbz No DAC I know sounds like a P3. The closest I've come to the wonderful tonality of mine was a borrowed NAIM CD2x, but at $5000 and not being a DAC it's not all that useful in this case.

wow, what a drag. have you heard the Apollo?

 

[Garbz]

Nope. The Jupiter was nice, and so was the planet. It's not something against perticular cdplayers, but I find if your records are in perfect nick and your turntable setup correctly it is easier to get very involving sound out of a turntable for less money. The key word here is involving. There are many a good cdplayer out there for tens of thousands of dollars which can extract all the detail in the world smoothly, but yet are unexciting to listen to. I have yet to find a turntable setup that didn't cause me to bob my head regardless of how bad it sounded. Vinyl thing? Maybe.

But if what you value in the P3 is the sense of rythm it conveys then you may want to look at certain Marantz or Naim players (only 2 I know which do this well, there may be others).

 

[proglife]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Garbz But if what you value in the P3 is the sense of rythm it conveys then you may want to look at certain Marantz or Naim players (only 2 I know which do this well, there may be others).

The sense of rhythm is nice, but it's really the "naturalness" and "texture" that grabs me. I'm pretty new to this vinyl thing and I still can't get over it. I've heard great CD based setups before, but the Rega makes those systems sound like reproductions of music and not like REAL music.

Honestly, it makes me want to spread the vinyl gospel to all these people obsessing over digital things...that's why I ask here: is it possible to get anything close to my P3 in a digital format? If my P3 gets a grade of an A to my ears, the best digital I've heard is barely a C.

Source first, for sure!

 

[Garbz]

Well I don't think you'll find the answer in Tube vs solid state, or Non-OS vs OS etc. In my experience you can find very different sounds within each catagory showing it's not the technology but rather the implimenation. Except for Non-OS stuff, this has just always sounded dirty to my ears, and I just don't see the point of it from an engineering standpoint. It's outdated.

What budget are you looking at? Those rega players certainly have the lovely naturalness, as had the MusicFidelity A3.5 Cdplayer (the only one which sounded good IMHO).

I suggest you go and shop around. Grab some music and sit yourself in a hifi store for a while. If you find something you like ask to audition it at home.