I agree that high-end magazines are delusional and unscientific. Nowdays it's very commercial rather than acheiving something scientific.
DAC despite processing 1's or 0's is a complexed logical device (especially today's advanced ones).
Our todays' CD digital format has 16-bit on 'vertical Y axis' and 44.1kHz samplig freequency on 'horizontal X axis'.
Giving example of the highest range of audiable freequencies such as 20kHz will roughly have only 2...3 digital samples * 16bit will yield 36bits of overall resolution.
First DACs processed one bit at a time. The advantage of these DACs is simplicity of the design and logic. The disadvantage is high probability of error meaning to give instead of 5-bits amplitude 3 or 7 bits amplitude since the 'receiving one-bit register' only cares about signal presence or absence i.e. '0' or '1'. Hence the quality of a digital equipment was 90% depended on the analog process which is filtering and buffering garbage.
Nowdays DACs are much more advanced they process sample by sample which may contain upto 24 bits amplitude and upto 192kHz sampling freequency. The proccessing by 'word' or taking the whole sample onto the register allows to logically analyze 'condition' of a particular word hence reducing drastically the probability of error. The DAC ICs are just like jewelry can be dirt cheap and can be pricey depending on what capability they all have and certainly newer and advanced models (such as Benchmark's relocking) would run at the higher price tag but soon will be reduced as the time passes by just like with PCs.
The listening difference vs. old processors is substantial especially on higher freequency details and also dynamics. Less listening fatigue and more natural sound.
The corresponding price of a digital equipment is another point of convincing price paid vs. performance, but often it's not true and not scientifically proven where I agree with poster since the fully functional digital unit that supposingly has the best DAC IC(s) and all possible functions, read all possible high resolution formats can't be priced $10k. Hence I don't think that there's something possibly more advanced and perfect than Grace Design M902 DAC-Preamp-Headphone amp.
DAC despite processing 1's or 0's is a complexed logical device (especially today's advanced ones).
Our todays' CD digital format has 16-bit on 'vertical Y axis' and 44.1kHz samplig freequency on 'horizontal X axis'.
Giving example of the highest range of audiable freequencies such as 20kHz will roughly have only 2...3 digital samples * 16bit will yield 36bits of overall resolution.
First DACs processed one bit at a time. The advantage of these DACs is simplicity of the design and logic. The disadvantage is high probability of error meaning to give instead of 5-bits amplitude 3 or 7 bits amplitude since the 'receiving one-bit register' only cares about signal presence or absence i.e. '0' or '1'. Hence the quality of a digital equipment was 90% depended on the analog process which is filtering and buffering garbage.
Nowdays DACs are much more advanced they process sample by sample which may contain upto 24 bits amplitude and upto 192kHz sampling freequency. The proccessing by 'word' or taking the whole sample onto the register allows to logically analyze 'condition' of a particular word hence reducing drastically the probability of error. The DAC ICs are just like jewelry can be dirt cheap and can be pricey depending on what capability they all have and certainly newer and advanced models (such as Benchmark's relocking) would run at the higher price tag but soon will be reduced as the time passes by just like with PCs.
The listening difference vs. old processors is substantial especially on higher freequency details and also dynamics. Less listening fatigue and more natural sound.
The corresponding price of a digital equipment is another point of convincing price paid vs. performance, but often it's not true and not scientifically proven where I agree with poster since the fully functional digital unit that supposingly has the best DAC IC(s) and all possible functions, read all possible high resolution formats can't be priced $10k. Hence I don't think that there's something possibly more advanced and perfect than Grace Design M902 DAC-Preamp-Headphone amp.