Dac Technology Mature?

@frozentundra @jond Thanks for your kind words. PS Audio make some nice gear, though their designs as you pointed out have limited upgradeability. I see firmware updates for the dac as a kind of pandora’s box; you could just as easily subjectively move forward as backwards in sound.

A fully modular dac offers greater flexibility and would be more future proof which helps protect your investment. Vitus for example are offering a dac/streamer module for the new Vitus RI-101 integrated amp which supports Airplay, Roon, MQA, Tidal, Spotify, etc. And i’m told they are planning to offer a streamer module for my player in future.

Picking up on Shadorne’s comment, remember it’s all about implementation. And that comes down to the skill of the designer and the company’s manufacturing capacity. As I said, the digital part (incl: the dac chips) in total would contribute no more than about 15% or so to the complete sound. The psu and analog stage, combined with pcb layout matters more.

I think there will always be variations in sound quality, just like there are in preamps and amps. 

Now, is it mature? Over the past 10 years many DACs have stepped up. The tell for me is Redbook playback. It is suddenly MUCH better than before, and now Hi-Rez recordings don't hold the large improvement in sound quality they used to. One example of just before this cut-off is the ARC DAC 8. It really is mediocre with Redbook, but great with 96/24.

The Mytek Brooklyn is always better than the DAC 8 in all formats, and has a much smaller step (if any) from 44/16 to 96/24 or DSD. 

Yes. Quite mature. There is now an effort to go backwards towards 20 year old DAC technology like R-2R. This is a sure sign that the market is saturated with mature products. There are simply are a lot of good DACs out there.

+10000 @melbguyone fantastic response!

Wow;Melbourne;

That response is one of the most complete answers with examples that I have read on this site

Your comment on Modularity for future proof is a nice one.
Ps Audio touts the software upgrade as future proof, but they have 10 different models and continue to expand models vs pick “ a” model and work on one over 20 years, ie A Camry or Accord model 

Many thanks

I am currently, not sure of DAC technology.
It appears we are being overwhelmed with technical details for marketing to grab our $$$ and differentiate products.
ThAt is a sign of a mature market

But, but The DSD side really has my attention, but no place to listen to & Real expensive
I’ve heard just a few SACD albums and like the sound.
I have be officially “ marketed “ and stabbed.

I’m really dumbfounded as a nice sound from a  dac can be $250 to $89,000.......,....,,


jeff

In my opinion, manufactures are doing everything they can to "get a leading edge" in technology - instead of focussing on music. Overall the dac chips gives very little to the complete sound. I would say the digital part in total would contribute no more than about 15% or so to the complete sound. The psu and analog stage, combined with pcb layout matters more.

I used to own arguably the best Delta Sigma dac ever made, the Vimak DS-1800 Mk2. Vimak invented Delta Sigma dac technology, and the DS-1800 to my knowledge is the only dac of its type implemented with a discrete architecture. Such an incredibly complex design would be too expensive today. Now all Delta Sigma dacs use miniaturized chips. Yet even the Vimak would be soundly beaten out by most high end dacs today. But that’s not because of digital audio converter. Component and material quality, psu’s, upsamplers, tolerances etc have also improved over time, as has manufacturing equipment. And there are many more manufacturers in the market today.

I currently own a Vitus SCD-025 Mk2 cdp which uses two Analog Devices AD1955 dacs in mono mode. I recall asking Hans Vitus if they’d compared the AD1955 to other highly regarded NOS dac chips like the BB PCM-1704k or TDA-1541A double crown. I was told they had compared them to everything & that in the context of their design requirements, there are others that are good, but not directly better - just "different".

So in summary, yes I think dac technology is now mature and should remain so for some time, however new standards will continue to appear over time like DSD and MQA. My spinner supports up to DSD128 and 32bit 384KHz PCM, but not MQA (though I personally think MQA is a gimmick). Hence if you were considering buying a high end dac you plan to keep, it makes sense to look for a dac which is modular in design (like Vitus) that enables upgrades over time. My 2c.