Hi Denny,
Had My SFD2 Series 1 updated to Series 3 almost a year ago. Well worth the dough! Many moons ago, I auditioned a Series 2 Dac against my piece and found that the principal change (addition of HDCD capability) was not to my liking. Yeah, it sounded better playing the few HDCDs in my collection but worse on everything else. Word has it that those first generation PMD filter chips, through which all signals were routed, really weren't all that great sounding. Well the latest PMD filters work just fine thank you. Principal differences seem to be a sweeter top end and a further reduction in sonic grit from the Series 1 Dac. The already quiet noise floor is quieter still. Sonic Frontiers has also incorporated some cool user cofigurable hotrod features. You are able to alter the degree of dithering and you can overide the HDCD mandated 6db reduction in level of non-HDCD material. The latter trick improves the Dac's dynamics on said material. As far as the Upsampler goes, I have one but don't use it all the time. If you wanted an upsampler, I may be able to help. I think I can get my hands on one. Highly recomended. Even with the used market as it is you couldn't score this level of sound for that small an upgrade investment to your existing piece. Let me know if you'd like some help aquiring an upsampler.
Had My SFD2 Series 1 updated to Series 3 almost a year ago. Well worth the dough! Many moons ago, I auditioned a Series 2 Dac against my piece and found that the principal change (addition of HDCD capability) was not to my liking. Yeah, it sounded better playing the few HDCDs in my collection but worse on everything else. Word has it that those first generation PMD filter chips, through which all signals were routed, really weren't all that great sounding. Well the latest PMD filters work just fine thank you. Principal differences seem to be a sweeter top end and a further reduction in sonic grit from the Series 1 Dac. The already quiet noise floor is quieter still. Sonic Frontiers has also incorporated some cool user cofigurable hotrod features. You are able to alter the degree of dithering and you can overide the HDCD mandated 6db reduction in level of non-HDCD material. The latter trick improves the Dac's dynamics on said material. As far as the Upsampler goes, I have one but don't use it all the time. If you wanted an upsampler, I may be able to help. I think I can get my hands on one. Highly recomended. Even with the used market as it is you couldn't score this level of sound for that small an upgrade investment to your existing piece. Let me know if you'd like some help aquiring an upsampler.