Do you recall "instant improvement" from your first stand-alone DAC ?

It was a bespoke design / built Standalone DAC that was the part of a Digital Source that converted me to having Analogue and Digital as a Source. 

For approx' 32 years of CD being a method to replay recorded Music, my system was not using digital. 

I know individuals who live and breathe CD as a Hard Medium Source, and apparently I fell well onto my feet with accepting this DAC that has Valves used in the circuit. 

For pure musical enjoyment and want to experience recorded music, digital in my system is parity with analogue. 

I am now looking at other forms of a digital source and will have two sources being digital at some time, in conjunction with analogue. 

Using a recorded music which is a file data that is not part of a tangible experience to manage when creating a replay, will be more like using a radio, but I do that a lot anyways. 

My first DAC was some cheapo optical to RCA converter to get audio out of my bare-bones plasma screen into my circa 1977 Kenwood integrated.  It worked well enough for TV Audio.

Then I bought a Cambridge DAC200 for use in live sound production, and it made enough of a difference that I could hear the improvement in my computer speakers.

When I got serious about a system for my office I started with a Parasound DAC, but it was unreliable and eventually blew up one of my ELAC speakers, so I picked up a Pro-Ject Pre Box S2 that sounded better all around, better bass control, longer tails, etc., but the big upgrade was a DAC3 from Benchmark.  I'd say the biggest improvement is in SN ratio, it's dead quiet and since it's the HGC version I can run the output level at full studio-level (0db) into my AHB2 amp.  I'm very satisfied with this combo, feeding ATC monitors.

Most benefits are in the area of clarity and crispness.  I started out in digital with an Arcam Delta 70 player then later added an Arcam Black Box DA converter and went on from there. 

I didn’t, but yesterday i turned on my Cary dac and it sounded better than my Marantz ruby. So was it the CD or me? 

I stepped up from using the DAC in a McIntosh C52 to an Allnic D-10000. Granted, the Allnic is pretty high-end, being tube driven, output transformer-less and output capacitor-less. The difference was profound. More of everything: black backgrounds, soundstage, warmth, and an analog-like sound. It’s amazing how a dedicated DAC can change your digital game.