New to dac/cd transport concept

You might very well get some improvement on CD with a separate DAC, but I would try to borrow one before taking the plunge. There have been steady improvements with CD over the years and some current budget players can equal or exceed the top DACs of yesteryear. With respect to SACD, forget about an outboard DAC. The digital signal is different and requires a special transport and DAC. EMM Labs makes such a combo but you're talking many thousands. Other campanies may be producing similar, but they are still expensive.

8260 will not output a digital signal when SACD is playing. you can use the analog outputs of your 8260 to listen to SACD and at the same time have a digital cable going from 8260 to a separate dac for redbook playback. you just need to use 2 different inputs on your preamp, one for dac and one for 8260. Of course you will have to have 2 sets of anlog interconnects as well if you want to do this, unless you are going to switch them between the dac and the player.

IMO, if you get a good used dac, playing a redbook disc on it will most likely blow away the 8260 playing the same disc SACD version, so you will have no desire to listen to SACDs on it.

There are no outboard DACS that will decode the DSD datastream of SACD. There are no absolute answer as to whether a single box or a dac/transport is superior.

Russe41,

Well where to start. You will not find a high end Transport DAC combination that will play SACD as it is a proprietary format. If memory serves me correctly Denon and Sony have SACD outputs from some of their players that will feed their AVP's.

Transport DAC combinations are reserved for redbook (CD) playback.

When I made the leap to seperates for a digital front end I found the transport made a significant difference. It took 4 transports to reach the level that I was after.

The transports ability to read and transfer the data from the CD to the transport is IMHO very important.

Ok that said I feel you can find a good used DAC for 1K. I would recomend a digital cable from Bluejeans cable (Just google it). Then find a used theta data basic II transport for $600.00. Then spend the other 400 on your favorite music.

I feel that you will not miss SACD with a good redbook front end.

Good luck.

>>There are no outboard DACS that will decode the DSD datastream of SACD.
>>You will not find a high end Transport DAC combination that will play SACD as it is a proprietary format.

Where did you get this from? There are several transport/DAC combos that play SACD, including but not limited to EMM Labs, Esoteric, dCS, MBL and you'll find many others by searching around in here.

Osgorth,

What connections are these manufactures using from the transport to DAC. I am interested as my DAC is DSD capible but only has RCA and optical inputs.

Thank you

I can't answer you there I'm afraid, since I have no experience with any of them. :) I play only regular CDs for now.

Check out the thread called "Reference DACs - an overall perspective"-something and ask the guys in there, they are very knowledgeable.

Am resurrecting this thread in the hope of getting some advice for my system. I hope Russe41 won't mind. I'm thinking about trying an outboard DAC to improve sound on playback of redbook CDs from a Cambridge Audio D500SE. The D500SE has a BNC digital out jack but no RCA digital out which I gather can limit choices. Is it realistic to expect improvements going to an outboard DAC with a max. budget of $600? Willing to buy used. The motivator here is that, I've been so impressed with the effect of upgrades to TT & pre-amp on vinyl, I'm wondering how I might get my CDs to sound better. Thanks in advance for your time and advice. (Equipment: JoLida 502B, Totem Forests, JPS Lab Ultraconductor speaker cables (bi-wired), Superconductor FX Interconnects).

Ghost, may be. Something like this?
http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?dgtlconv&1190270541

Check these on e-bay as well....

A Bel Canto DAC1 would be a signiciant improvement. Available used for under $500. BNC/RCA adapters are easily available.

Audphile1, Narrod -
Thank you. I had in fact skimmed some of the DAC classifieds. Lots of options and quite a range of prices there...hard to know where to begin sorting things out. Your suggestions are much appreciated.

I had a Bel Canto DAC2 that I really liked. I have compared it with a Marantz 8260 and the DAC2 was better. Only reason I did not recommend the DAC2 is I don't know what their market value would be right now and I am not sure you would obtain one for $600.