recommendation to upgrade source

Hi,

Would like to get some suggestions on my setup. Currently I have:

- squeezebox 3 connected to wired ether net to stream music on my server (NAS)
- used a TubeMagic headphone amp as my DAC
- Exposure 2010 integrated amp
- Harbeth Compact 7ES3 speaker

Recently i started to experiment the change of source and had a big surprise. In my current setup I always have unpleasant brightness in the sound. Intially I suspect it's the room but after I move the setup to another room the improvement is not significant. Listening to piano solo on this thing is quite tiring.

A friend suggested I changed the source to try so I took an old unused Panasonic DVD player (S55 model) and used that. And wow, what a big improvement in sound. It's hard to describe but music just sound right. Piano is a lot more pleasant. The difference is very significant as it has also been verified in a friends system comparing with Cambridge DAC magic. Sound is probably not as detailed as DAC magic but very musical and no brightness.

Since then I also experimented a few:
1. use Squeezebox internal DAC - not good
2. use Augioengine D1 feed through USB through lab top - not good.

It seems that my $100 DVD player beat all these. Just hard to believe but that's the case for my setup.

Now I only want to listen music through the DVD player. But in the long run I still want to do streaming as it's a lot more convenient. I did quite some reading on the DAC technology on jitter etc. and it seems that not only I need to have a better DAC but also a good transport to be able to compete the sound with a good CD player. Wonder what's your suggestions to upgrade for both DAC and transport ?

Thanks