[computerparts]

I notice there are a ton of threads around here asking about dacs. So, I'm thinking of compiling a list with reviews of vintage dacs throughout various price points. This will take a lot of time as I plan to review every dac I can get my hands on. Just wanted to see if people would be interested and if it would benefit the Head-Fi community. What are your thoughts?

 

[estreeter]

Compile away

 

[Bblitz]

+1
 
Quote:

Compile away

 

[ben201]

it will be a huge help for me for sure

 

[snapple10]

Tha will be really helpful; thanks in advance for your effort

 

[The Monkey]

I think it's an excellent idea.

 

[mcmalden]

I think it's a good idea since it would be a great contibution to this forum. Kind of like skylab did with this ridiculous amount of headphone amps, makes me see the way through the headphone amp forrest

.

 

[computerparts]

Good to see that there is some interest. I will also include some cd players since I already have one on the way, depends what I can get my hands on. Also feel free to make requests and I'll see what I can do. Just keep in mind we are talking about vintage equipment so I'd like to keep the manufacturing time frame in between 1990-2000. I have finished my write up of the Proceed DAP and will be posting shortly. Next in line is the Musical Fidelity A3 cd player, then the Sonic Frontiers SFD-1 tube dac and Theta DS Pro Basic dac.

 

[estreeter]

Quote:

Just keep in mind we are talking about vintage equipment so I'd like to keep the manufacturing time frame in between 1990-2000.

I'd like to see something similar done with amps - both headphone amps and integrated amps. There is a mountain of enthusiast info out there on amps from the 70s and 80s but I havent seen a whole lot on the 90s - I suspect that this is largely because it was a traumatic time for many higher end brands, being taken over by the big corporations and forced to put their brand on inferior kit.
 
Would be interesting to put some of your vintage DACs (including those in CDPs) alongside the current wave of asynch USB and Firewire DACs in a listening test.

 

[computerparts]

I will only be doing dacs and cd players as I have quite a bit of experience with those over the years. My setup is not headphone based so I feel I would not be experienced enough to offer reviews on any headphone amps. Also, I have no experience with usb or firewire based hardware so I will not be reviewing any of those. Perhaps someone else can do something with that.

 

[graben]

This is a fantastic idea. I know my vintage DAC sounds much better at the same price compared some newer DACs I have tried.

 

[computerparts]

That is the main motive for wanting to do this. There are many vintage dacs/players that were very expensive when first introduced and now with the years gone by, their value has dropped dramatically. Many people are unaware of the price to performance ratio that can be had with vintage dacs/players. IMO there are vintage dacs out there that can be had for say around $200 that could rival more modern stuff costing up to $2k

 

[yupoet]

go ahead please . looking forward to the output~~really thanks !
 
 

 

[wcamspacher]

Please, please do this. I'm in the $200 range and would love nothing more than to see this list.

 

[estreeter]

Quote:

Please, please do this. I'm in the $200 range and would love nothing more than to see this list.

 
You realize that he is talking about 10-20 year old DACs, dont you ? This is the era before every computer/lifestyle mag/e-zine/blog editor realized that you could hook a DAC up to your trendy Macbook/Sony and amaze your friends with the newfound sound quality. The clocks in many of these vintage DACs/CDPs were undeniably high quality, with undeniably high *price tags* to match. Interesting to see how well these have fared on the resale market over time.