DAC mistake

[awsmone]

Yes I have two Shibas: Haku and Hiro names from the Miyazaki “Spirted Away” movie.

The difficulty is SACD. Keeping a spinner that can do SACD and then also do a computer connection is problematic. Not that there aren’t many products that can’t do it, it’s more that I was looking for something a bit extra in sound quality. I had been a longtime digital bigot. But there are now several DACs that bridge the analog-digital gap. So if you can make the leap to an ALL computer file based music system, it is easier. There are ways to rip your SACD collection to DSD or DSF files which I won’t go into. That information is readily available.

Either the Lampizator or the Totaldac are excellent solutions and while I haven’t heard it myself The Aries Cerat Kasandra belongs in that little group.

Roon running in a good computer has excellent “on the fly” upsampling capabilities. I have found that resampling to DSD 256 works very well into the Pacific.

Yes but a really good one, which does SACD well is the issue

My short list

T and A MP3100
Esoteric K1xs
Ayon CD 35se
Luxman d08u
Playback designs dream MPS8
EMM Labs xrds v2

 

[stereonut8]

Yes but a really good one, which does SACD well is the issue

My short list

T and A MP3100
Esoteric K1xs
Ayon CD 35se
Luxman d08u
Playback designs dream MPS8
EMM Labs xrds v2

EMM Labs is on my bucket list. (fat chance) By the way, I ordered 2 DVD-As and an XRCD (my first) yesterday while waiting for the Ayre to arrive on Friday. One of the DVD-As is The Beatles LOVE produced by George Martin. I've seen it used in a few reviews.

 

[stereonut8]

Well I've had the C-5xeMP running for a couple of days now. Right out of the box and still quite cold from being in an unheated UPS truck (I actually met the delivery guy in my driveway and nearly ripped it from his arms) It sounded very good via Zu Mission XLRs to my Primare I32. I didn't have much time to listen because we had guests. The next day I gave it a good spin, but it's still opening up. At this point CDs and SACDs are wonderful. They just grab you. My daughter was walking through the room and actually stopped to comment while I was playing a Norah Jones SACD. She's never done that before. DVDs don't sound much better than the Oppo at this point and frankly it's not worth the PIA to navigate on the Ayre. That may change with a little more burn in. Ayre says that the unit must re-burn after an extended time off.

My next challenge is burning a few CDs. My 320 kbps MP3 files will need to be converted to 44.1 or 44 kHz. Any recommendations for good software for a newbie would be appreciated.

In summary, I'm pretty happy I made this mistake!

 

[rsrzr]

Why would anyone have a pc in an audio room? I did this a dozen years ago and since getting any server out of the room and stopped using usb, sound quality jumped. Also, if you must have a pc in the room, never have a monitor. Use a headless unit with a tablet as the monitor

 

[jasbirnandra]

Are there any DACs or servers that support video for navigation? I'm searching; but haven't found one yet.

See the grandinote VOLTI

 

[stereonut8]

Thanks! I'll look into it.