*DAC

my 2 cents

the r26 is really excellent, one would truly need a mega system to hear significant sonic benefit to pricier dacs - i feel it strikes a wonderful balance between uber clarity and musicality, and it has very good spatial qualities

i would work on getting the feed into the r26 is clean and pure as possible to let it be at its best before getting on the dac merry go round (the front end improvements would benefit most other more expensive dac choices as well)

i use the r26 in a roon based system, it is truly excellent

different strokes for different folks of course but in my experience i prefer the r26 over the yggy lim... i feel the lim rolls off the highs a bit much and slurs leading edges of transients while the r26 is more extended and ’faster’ without being harsh, all the while providing excellent sense of scale and soundstage - i actually prefer the old yggy over the lim as it plays a cleaner/purer sound to my ear, not artificially warmed up/softened/smoothed -- but i can see the lim being more suitable to lively sounding systems needing some ’calming’ -- klipsch, tekton, zu, focal owners for instance

@jjss49 @yyzsantabarbara They say there are noticeable differences between the X - R & A 26 DACs, so I can see where the confusion lies. I would love to try both the A26 and the Yiggi+ LIM (not to mention a 1/2 dozen others that are out there)

i have not tried (nor am i inclined to try) the gustard dacs other than the r26... i have been fairly skeptical of these chinese companies in shenzhen cranking out endless dac model variations seemingly every month using a common chassis

but about a year ago there was truly a groundswell of positivity about the r26 from all the usual sources of hifi marketing/hype, so i tried one on a lark (bought it used so i could resell in a jiffy if it didn’t please) but to my surprise (and a bit to my dismay), it has, it does -- it is just a wonderful sounding streamer dac that really fits my use case perfectly (roon)

all a long way of saying that even in our lofty world of high end hifi, ’being stuck with a gustard r26’ in one’s system is no hardship in the least -- one truly needs to go deep into nosebleed territory to beat it sonically