Let's Get A Consensus Of The Best DAC's In The Market Today

[Bruce B]

Isn't this the same what computer experts tell you? They tell you to buy the fastest and highest end you can afford.

 

[DaveyF]

Isn't this the same what computer experts tell you? They tell you to buy the fastest and highest end you can afford.

Yup, been there and done that, bought the latest and "greatest"... a VERY costly mistake.

 

[Bruce B]

Yup, been there and done that, bought the latest and "greatest"... a VERY costly mistake.

Sorry you're having computer problems!

 

[DaveyF]

Thanks, Bruce. But we're talking years ago when I ante'd up for the latest PC with a top of the line Intel processor and something like 2.5 gigs of memory....at a price of many 1000's of $$! I'm sure most of us can remember when 2.5 gigs of memory was SOTA. Just like today when 4XDSD and whatever the current up-sampling max is. Isn't it interesting how cheap memory has become in the last few years...Nowadays even a few terabytes isn't special, or that costly!

 

[storelli]

Hi Davey, this is Fabio from Alma Audio....we just received the new MSB Select that we'll be using at one of our rooms at Newport. Amazing DAC, everybody is invited to listen to it at the store or/and at Newport.

Best
Fabio

 

[DaveyF]

Hi Fabio, nice to see you here.

I will plan on stopping by at Newport.
Will be there on Friday.

 

[LL21]

There may by an AN Level 5 DAC @ THE Show. I should hear it, too.
Of course, one is not ever hearing 'it' in isolation.

Let us know what you think. Note, I believe there are 3 different AN DAC 5s: DAC 5 Special, DAC 5 Signature...and DAC 5th Element (its not on website, but definitely MC reviewed it a few years ago in Hi-Fi Critic...i have the issue). Its this last one which is the game changer according to MC, and i think MC had heard the earlier incarnations.

 

[skolis]

maybe covered elsewhere, and I missed it, but anyone have experience or comments
about either Meitner MA1 or EMM Labs DAC2X?

 

[sly30]

I had: Esoteric K-01, MSB Diamond IV, MSB Signature IV, EMM Labs DAC 2X, Audio Aero La Fountaine, MBL Noble, Metronome C-8, Accustic Arts DAC II mk2, Vitus Masterpiece DAC, Thrax DAC, Bricasti DAC, Reimyo, Audio Research Ref.DAC and some more. The best in my 2 systems was Gryphon Kalliope. Most musical, detail, most saturate, best colours, deep, wide soundstage. Very close was Thrax. Very good DAC. Most of them was very good, but this two was the best. Gryphon nr 1, Thrax nr.2.

 

[dallasjustice]

You know the Thrax gets its resistor boards from MSB, right?

I had: Esoteric K-01, MSB Diamond IV, MSB Signature IV, EMM Labs DAC 2X, Audio Aero La Fountaine, MBL Noble, Metronome C-8, Accustic Arts DAC II mk2, Vitus Masterpiece DAC, Thrax DAC, Bricasti DAC, Reimyo, Audio Research Ref.DAC and some more. The best in my 2 systems was Gryphon Kalliope. Most musical, detail, most saturate, best colours, deep, wide soundstage. Very close was Thrax. Very good DAC. Most of them was very good, but this two was the best. Gryphon nr 1, Thrax nr.2.

 

[Peter Breuninger]

Let us know what you think. Note, I believe there are 3 different AN DAC 5s: DAC 5 Special, DAC 5 Signature...and DAC 5th Element (its not on website, but definitely MC reviewed it a few years ago in Hi-Fi Critic...i have the issue). Its this last one which is the game changer according to MC, and i think MC had heard the earlier incarnations.

I have the 5th Element in my system with the CDT Six, this kit offer the most relaxing and involved Red Book I've ever heard. It's like playing records. I am getting zero digital hardness.

 

[sly30]

You know the Thrax gets its resistor boards from MSB, right?

Yes, Thrax uses some MSB parts and some ideas by Rumen from Thrax. This DAC sounds better than MSB IV Diamond.

 

[edorr]

I stumbled upon this post title. The whole premise is fatally flawed. It is like Let's Get A Consensus Of The Best Wine for sale today / the prettiest woman on the planet / The best car on the market. An exercise in futility.

 

[amirm]

Isn't this the same what computer experts tell you? They tell you to buy the fastest and highest end you can afford.

Indeed. I bought my Mark Levinson NO36S in 1999/2000 I think. I got the "S" version which was the hand tweaked one. It was super "expensive" in my book. Fast forward 15 years and it routinely beats current DACs in measurements and performance. It is limited to 96 Khz but otherwise, it remains a reference product.

Just noticed the typo on the date for the ML . But otherwise, look at how clean and textbook that response is. Peak correlated distortions is at -130 dbFS.

One capacitor died in it last year which was a 5 minute repair and the thing keeps going.

Look at its incoming jitter reduction:

60 db! That is one million times reduction of incoming jitter!

That is why this thread has merit. Get the best and you too can be proud of what you bought 15 years later as I have . I have supercharged mine with async USB to AES bridge (Berkeley) and I am good now other than missing 192 Khz from time to time.

 

[amirm]

I stumbled upon this post title. The whole premise is fatally flawed. It is like Let's Get A Consensus Of The Best Wine for sale today / the prettiest woman on the planet / The best car on the market. An exercise in futility.

We have a far bigger problem if this is like wine. That means that none of us or manufacturers have figured out the "truth" in audio. That everyone makes a different recipe than aiming to reproduce exactly what is recorded and represented in digital samples.

Fortunately objective evaluations shows this to not be the case. Frequency response is essentially dead flat so as far as coloration is concerned, it is not at all like there would be in wine where any two can taste so different, in blind or sighted tests. There is potentially differences in filtering, analog stage, and suppression of distortion. But none rise to the level of differences in wines and such.

But let's say you are right. As I explained before, did you pick a DAC randomly or researched and decided to buy the best you could? I assume it is the latter. If so, then someone could save that research and start with where you ended. Sending people out there blind doesn't make sense to me. Surely if 8 out of 10 of us think XYZ DAC should be on top of your evaluation list, as some are popping up that way already, folks need to seriously consider such option. I don't know why we would not want to have this kind of consensus out there.

And it is not like we are crowning just one device. We are saying what are the top 10, accepting that consensus around one and only one does not exist.

 

[LL21]

I had: Esoteric K-01, MSB Diamond IV, MSB Signature IV, EMM Labs DAC 2X, Audio Aero La Fountaine, MBL Noble, Metronome C-8, Accustic Arts DAC II mk2, Vitus Masterpiece DAC, Thrax DAC, Bricasti DAC, Reimyo, Audio Research Ref.DAC and some more. The best in my 2 systems was Gryphon Kalliope. Most musical, detail, most saturate, best colours, deep, wide soundstage. Very close was Thrax. Very good DAC. Most of them was very good, but this two was the best. Gryphon nr 1, Thrax nr.2.

I need to get over to see Gryphon at their showroom at their HQ...thanks for that.

 

[LL21]

I have the 5th Element in my system with the CDT Six, this kit offer the most relaxing and involved Red Book I've ever heard. It's like playing records. I am getting zero digital hardness.

Thanks for that! When is your review coming out? Look forward to reading it for sure.


Without asking too leading a question, are you supportive of Martin Collom's comments? Is it THAT much better than everything else that you have heard? He certainly has ranked it far above the rest of the high end digital reviewed at HiFi Critic. Top digital of yesteryear hit about 105-120...latest is 240-300...AN DAC 5th Element, he scores at 450 and potentially felt it might have been limited by the rest of his system's limitations.

 

[dallasjustice]

Yes, Thrax uses some MSB parts and some ideas by Rumen from Thrax. This DAC sounds better than MSB IV Diamond.

Okay. I haven't heard the Thrax. But your claim about "better" seems a bit suspect from an objective viewpoint.

R2R DACs heavily rely on resistor accuracy to get best sound quality. MSB makes their own resistors at varying tolerance. The diamond uses MSB's most accurate resistors. The Thrax gets the entry level restistors from MSB. So, I doubt very much the Thrax is close to the sound quality of the diamond. I've owned the totaldac, so I have a little experience with similar DACs.

 

[asiufy]

The MSB Select was just put next to the Audio Note UK player.

https://www.facebook.com/MSBTech?fref=ts



I haven't heard ours yet, but the word is that it's like Peter said, "like playing records".


alexandre

 

[mauidan]

Larry Gullman, aka Mr. MSB, says that the company's new Select II DAC ($89,950), which is due in 30 days and will also be active at next week's THE Show Newport Beach, uses new input and output hybrid DAC modules that click in and out for customization and upgrades. Separate modules are optimized for PCM (up to 768kHz) and DSD (up to 8x, or DSD512), which should keep even the most obsessive amongst us happy until DSDx16 comes along. A ladder DAC that obviates the need for either an output buffer or op amp, it sums a total of 16 channels to create a low-impedance, high-current output. The output is so high that you can use it with headphones without any amplification.