Your favourite DAC?

[dionisio]

Any heard the renaissance invicta dac? Hugely expensive, I am curious to hear if that cost could be justified. I have some fairly worn socks so in my case that would be a no.

I have one, it is expensive but in my system clearly bests the other DACs I've tried by a fair margin. Made some comments to that effect a few pages ago in this thread.

[anthonyTD]

Hi All,
As feelings were running high yesterday between Stan And Dave i had to close the thread once again while i tried to get to the bottom of what the real issue was.
The issue Dave had last was with a statement from Stan stating that Dave had indeed asked for a replacement unit, to be fair i have since asked Stan to provide evidence of this, otherwise i would need him to retract the statement, below you will see the last part of an original email between Dave and Stan which seems to confirm Stans Statement.

>> Hi Stan,
>>
>> The BM has run in now and it is sounding fab, however there remains an annoying problem. Upon first switch on or when switching from optical to coaxial, the BM to fails to lock onto the signal from the coax input. A spitting sound eminates from the speakers and I have to cycle through all the inputs to clear it, which is a bit frustrating. This also occurs when I move from streaming music in Spotify to playing files from my hard drive using Foobar 2000. Do you have an idea what might be causing this?
>>
>> Regards
>>
>> Dave...
>>
>>
>
Hi Stan,

I have been chatting with some of the guys on AoS and after further cases of the Bushmaster freezing yesterday evening and on two occasions today I am fairly certain there must be something specificly wrong with this unit. I have lost all confidence in its reliability therefore I would like to request that it be exchanged for another unit under warranty please?

Regards
Dave...


Now, unless Dave has something to add that is contrary to what Stan has provided, then i would ask that both just move on from this and put it behind them, both are valued members here and i am sure both would admit that with hindsight they could have handled this differently, so, lets move on and get the thread back on track.
A...

[Bluedroog]

I have one, it is expensive but in my system clearly bests the other DACs I've tried by a fair margin. Made some comments to that effect a few pages ago in this thread.

I don't think I've ever heard a DAC approaching that level, probably for the best! Did you compare against anything at a similar level?

I heard the Leema DAC and found it a little aggressive, the system as a whole anyway. Plenty of detail though.

Might be an obvious choice but I thought the M-DAC sounded good and for the price I find the feature set very appealing and would like to try one in my system with my Squeezebox.

[accuphaseman]

MF Tri-Vista 21

Still use it .Don't like the half hour warm up though.

Want to try a MF M1

[icehockeyboy]

I've had 4 Dacs in my time.

Beresford TC 7510

Theta Pro Progeny A

Beresford Bushmaster mk 1

Beresford Bushmaster mk 2

The Theta, with its "extras" cost over £1700 new, the Beresfords a fraction of that, and to my ears, having had a period where i used the SBT without a dac at all, believe that the Beresfords outperform the far more expensive Theta.

The mk 2 notching up the ante yet again.

And no problems with it either!

[r100]

- Rega
- Beresford 7530
- Pioneer N-50
- Micromega MyDac
- and some others.

IMS (In my system ;-) they all sounded good. The Rega was, at the time, the most expensive one, so I sold it.

The Micromega MyDac sounded ok but made a horrible high pitched noise when switching input devices. In fact it was so loud that it made everybody jump when the volume was up. I got a replacement but the noise was still therre. With no firmware update foreseeable I sent it back.

The Beresford is unbeatble for the price IMO. I couldn't make out a significant difference between the Rega and the Beresford. I still have it.

The DAC in the N-50 is astonishingly good and the box itself doubles as a streamer. I still have it.

PS. What is new in the B 7533 ?

[Yomanze]

My favourite DAC is the Audial Model S, which is available direct from the engineer who designed it. Simply the most natural (non 'digital' sounding) DAC I've ever heard with the depth of soundstage, a lack of 'grain' that plagues most digital, and with the dynamic contrast that is expected with a high end analogue rig.

One big difference I find between CD and vinyl is the more 3D soundstage and more 'tactile' delineation between instruments with vinyl, but the Audial DAC suffers none of this

For bang for buck I would also have to vote the Beresford Bushmaster / linear supply as my favourite, putting a lot of so-called classics to shame. It is nowhere near my Audial DAC, sounds like 'very good digital' rather than 'great analogue', but at 1/10 of the price it's a no brainer.

[Oldpinkman]

I'd be interested to hear some serious candidates, but next time I'm visiting Rachel at Hartpury I'll put DaCapo in the boot if you have a couple of hours to spare Paul. I know it's a dinosaur and not eligible as a dac for anyone wanting to buy one, but it is my only serious point of reference (on CD). Be interesting to hear your Jolida's too

[wee tee cee]

MF Tri-Vista 21

Still use it .Don't like the half hour warm up though.

Want to try a MF M1

Had a MF M1 for a couple of years, loved it in my own room/set up .....BUT.....it can be fussy partnering wise. The rest of my system is pipe and slippers so worked really well in conjunction with the MF M1 HPA I was using as a single line active pre. Gone the passive pre/non upsampling route, happy just now-still tempted to add a MK2 BM had the MK1 for a while and enjoyed it as a DAC but also as a headamp.

[pete_mac]

My favourite DAC that I've owned is my current audio-gd DAC3SE, but my favourites out of the DACs that I've heard are the Metrum Hex and the Aurialic Invicta. Both are supremely transparent and utterly musical in the right system. That said, both are too rich for my blood!