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New vs. old DACs - opinions?

I'm on the market for a new DAC. I've noticed that you can find used DACs from, say, 8 years ago that are heavily marked down from their original price. I just saw one sell for $400 that was originally $1500, for example.

So, correct me if I'm wrong, but the progression of DACs seems very different from that of amps... an old amp, like McIntosh, is still highly competitive today... but it seems that newer DACs are more evolved, refined, and use higher quality parts for less money, right?

Another thought is - before DACs were as widely used as they are today, perhaps the mark-up was much greater in the past...? Where-as now, with the influx of foreign manufactured DACs, there is a healthy bit of competition that keeps prices down by limiting the manufacturer mark-up. Correct me if I'm off here as well.

So, overall I'm wondering if I would be better off buying something new like a Keces or MHDT DAC or finding something older that is heavily marked down.
djembeplay
mesch
3,410 posts
 
With so many quality USB/SPDIF converters on the used market, there are many options for taking advantage of older DACs. Many have far better power supplies and analog output staged than many of the newer ones, especially at the lower price points that the older DACs can be had for. Like with newer ones, the older ones sound different from each other so system matching remains important. 
audioengr
3,282 posts
 

Old D/A chips have the advantage of using ladder and NOS technology, but the disadvantage of not supporting hi-res and not dealing with HF transients very well.  They can sound very musical, but not quite live from top to bottom IMO.

New D/A chips are much faster and support hi-res, but they are more difficult to deliver power to.  The designer must have a very good bag of tricks to make them sing.  The issues are: power supply, decoupling, ground-planes, wiring, and most important: regulation.  Implementation is everything in a DAC.  Its not just about selecting the right D/A chip and doing a design with it.  The thing that sets most audiophile electronics apart from mid-fi is excellent power delivery.  Read lots of professional reviews and try to make a choice using these.  I personally trust Audiostream and usually 6-moons among others.


Steve N.

Empirical Audio

edpadden
11 posts
 
I have had a lot of DACs over the years. To me, all $1000 DACs and cheaper sound the same. It's when you spend more that they start to sound like music and not cold digital. I just bought an old Proceed DAP DAC and it sounds amazing compared to anything at the $1K mark. I had to buy a USB to ST Glass Fiber to interface my PC but I'm okay with that. Locked right up and played beautiful music. It's damn good. 
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