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Are DAC's overpriced?

External DAC's are pretty expensive imho... BUT I don't know that much on how to choose one. I want mostly cd's in my small two channel system... I am rebuilding after selling my Logans and Mac amp to go back to "drivers"! The Logans wore me out with Maintenance.  Should I buy a new cd player or get a new DAC for my old player?  
captbeaver

Showing 2 responses by kalali

kalali's avatar
kalali
1,977 posts
 
"At past audio shows, in every room with the benchmark dac, I spent an average of 2 minutes listening,"

Completely baseless conclusion. You can not isolate what you didn't like to just the DAC. You'd need to switch the DACs while keeping everything else the same, including the volume, in order to draw any meaningful conclusions. That said, Benchmark DACs can sound too revealing - garbage in garbage out. 
kalali's avatar
kalali
1,977 posts
 
I learned that many of these so-called vintage chips only support 16/44.1 Redbook rates. Not saying they’re bad, just saying they were designed for CD players as opposed to support the current hi-rez content at higher rates such as 24/96 or 24/192. Lots of folks prefer them over the ESS chips more targeted for hi-rez playback.Your ears/brain is the best judge.
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