affordable DAC for rock/metal

Rooski,

I had a pair of IIcs for a good 20 years and know their sound quite well!

Prior to my music major in university, I have been in a rock band before, don't ask, though i wasn't the only classical trained musician to be involved in rock.
This makes it tough to put together a system, I love the natural timbre and soundstage for classical and jazz music, but with rock, i like it aggressive, as i was also into sound recording, the modern rock recordings are heavily compressed in the final mixing, started in the late 80s like Motley crue, Extreme etc. then now bands like system of down and nu-metal stuff everything is so compressed from guitar to vocal. That's why DAC like havana dac(non oversampling) would sound great with classical rock, like led zepplin and rolling stone. My friend has ps audio dac(upsampling), and it does metallica really well, as with modern rock you might want to enjoy the instrument separation. This is not to say my Havana makes modern rock stuff sound bad, the kings of leon really rock with my Havana, you can really feel the vocal, or the emotion of it, if you analyse vocal as one instrument as well. And if you like the sound more alive, Havana does it very well, i love the drum snare it produces, so realistic. i highly recommend auditioning on havana and ps audio.
good luck
andy

My setup sounds a little smooth in the highs since I got the new tweeters. There's not enough 'bite'. I don't know if a DAC will make any different there.

I'm guessing I just need something that separates instruments well and is good at bringing out the initial sound of a percussion or guitar attack.

A good example is Celtic Frost's Monotheist, it has very aggressive guitars yet it's a little too smooth sounding to me.

The soundcard I'm using is real cheap, I described it to a friend as sounding like a teenager's boombox. No clarity or detail, just your average mass market sound.

M,

Your Onkyo is a Class D amp I believe. Not sure what design it is (IcePower or other), but I recently acquired an IcePower Class D amp and have found it to be quite good for hard rock/metal type music. The top end is quite smooth and not aggressive or fatiguing in any way. If your amp is similar, I would think it a synergistic match for Klipsch or horn speakers in general.

I have both mhdt paradisea tube ( 1 step down from havana) and Contantine SS DACs. I much prefer the SS DAC for rock/metal on my good system for just that reason. It provides more bite. The tube DAC is warmer and more enticingly smooth and rhythmic perhaps and works best for acoustic music I find. Note that tube rolling in the tube DAC can have a big effect. A NOS Tung Sol tube rather than the stock GE tube tightens things up and delivers a more SS sound.