From my personal experience, I think Elberoth2 has a point worth checking out. I paired a MF Tri Vista 21 DAC with my existing Arcam FMJ 23 CD player. With the amp I had at the time, I thought it was a great all around improvement. However,when I upgraded the amp to something with greater power and detail, I found a lot of high treble glare. At first, I thought it was the amp, or poor synergy with new speakers. Taking some advice,(quite counter-intuitive, might I add), I took the DAC out of the system; problem solved.
On the other hand, running the DAC with an old Theta Data Basic transport sounded great. The knowledgable retailer who advised me sells both separates and single box CD players, but is very leery of combining a DAC with a single box player.
On the other hand, running the DAC with an old Theta Data Basic transport sounded great. The knowledgable retailer who advised me sells both separates and single box CD players, but is very leery of combining a DAC with a single box player.