to @ghasley and other interested readers of this thread
We are talking minor differences to major differences but these differences are the discovery that most dacs these days commit sins of omission rather than 20 years ago when a dac would exhibit sins of commission. In short almost any of the dacs I had and sold on I could have lived happily ever after with....some do some things better but none are bad, just different.
i believe these are the most important words in his post... we need to not lose perspective, among well reputed and well established dacs into mid and high 4 figures, none are bad and the differences, even on a resolving system, are not huge, all are able to deliver wonderful, very analog listening experiences