I think good powered speakers are going make all components start to look like relics from the past. I’ve compared my Sonos internal dac to my mcintosh dac in the integrated to the Bryston bda 1 and it’s really hard for me to tell much of a difference. I second whoever mentioned isolation, power supply, and output stage as being very important. The work of converting digital to analog is about as start of art as it’s going to get IMO. There’s a great system out there for any budget.
Is there such a thing as a FOREVER DAC/streamer?
I know I might be talking about rehab in a back alley, but here it goes.
I've been looking to upgrade my Hegel H390's internal DAC. But I would only do it to knock it out of the park; as the Hegel's internal DAC does an admirable job. So the question is, is there such a thing as an end game-forever DAC. At the end of the day, DAC is a digital product. Digital technology evolve quicker than analog technology.
Will that Lumin X1, Bartok, Dave, etc be obsolete in 3 years? Thus making this a moot conversation...