Considering the TA-ZH1ES but mainly as a DAC using the PRE OUT to an Integrated Amp. Does the TA-ZH1ES perform well as a DAC in that scenario? I'm interested in its ability to upsample to DSD, but not if it's either compromised as a DAC or in the PRE OUT section.

Can you use the CMA600i  as a DAC only?     I was interested in using this as a DAC connected to my Home Theater Receiver, but didn't know how to hook it up since there would now be two volume controls - one on the CMA600i and the one on the Home Theater Receiver.  Would setting the CMA600i at...

Thank you for finding those posts.  I'm still a little confused and maybe it is because I really don't fully understand DSD.  In the first quote, the designer states that he can't put raw DSD in the DAC as it would sound too hard, so it is filtered which converts it to regular PCM.  Therefore...

I know that the Hugo accepts DSD natively as an input.  What I wanted to know was whether it converts DSD to PCM during its processing or keeps it as DSD the entire time until its converted to analog for output.   I plan on using the Hugo for both portable and home use in my main system.

Just curious if you could answer whether DSD is converted to PCM?  If so, are there any benefits to that approach versus a pure DSD process?

I don't think that DSD necessarily sounds better than PCM.  I just think it is always best to process files in their native format.  I would prefer to avoid the conversion from DSD to PCM and vice versa.

  I was looking to get a DAC that handles DSD natively (no conversion to PCM) and when I was researching the Chord DACs, I read that the QuteHD did not convert DSD to PCM.  I assume that the QuteEX is the same.  Then I read that the Hugo is even better and I decided to go for the Hugo, however...