Internal DAC quality vs external DAC's

the real, not so fun answer is it all depends

one box integrated units can be very good, but of course lack the flexibility to decouple the piece-parts - at the same time, they can be smart buys - for example an older gen hegel h160 has an older streamer/dac built in, but the preamp/amp section is still world class - so at $1700-1800 used now, the h160 will be a good buy even if you treat the dac as a throw-away...

streamer/dac combos have similar issues... dacs are maturing fast, lots of trickle down happening, oodles of connectivity options... streaming front end sand streamer protocols and connectivity formats may still have more room for development/format change over time (though many would argue that is rapidly stabilizing as well)

so it depends on the user, their desire for a la carte flexibility to change (at a real cost, as mentioned earlier), versus buy a good modern integrated unit, use a good music source - e.g. tidal or qobuz, and be ’one and done’, just enjoy the music with a minimum of clutter (and complexity and cabling and power supplies)...

There's no good reason a DAC can't be part of an integrated box.

Technically speaking, you can get superb measured performance from separates that beats any of the integrated boxes you listed for around the same price (e.g. Topping D90SE + LA90, $1800). The only issue with the Topping amp is its relatively low output power - 90 W @ 1% THD into 4 ohms. You didn't mention what speakers you were going to use, so it may not provide enough juice at the volume you want to listen to.

Do you already have a streamer? The Hegel seems to be the only one where you can stream from your phone using UPnP. That would really simplify things, if it's the direction you intend to go. Currently, I use a RPi 3 B+ with moOde for streaming duty.

Hope this helps.

lordmelton "DACs have a relatively short life of 5 years or less, amps 10 years or more, streamers somewhere in-between."

This statement is mistaken, erroneous and false a properly designed and constructed DAC can easily last many, many years as has been demonstrated by some of the most highly regarded manufacturers of such products there is simply no reason, justification, or logic to claim or assert otherwise. 

I like the one and done concept !!!

It's why I'm looking at the NAD M10 V2, it's an all in one streamer that can be controlled via phone/tablet.

The crazy part to all this is, each devise I've listed all have something I want. None with all the features I'd like, go figure.

The crazy part to all this is, each devise I've listed all have something I want. None with all the features I'd like, go figure.

I think that's the main challenge right now. Hopefully you find something that fits your needs.

Just remembered that I had a good experience with the Naim Uniti Atom this past weekend (though it was driving headphones from the speaker taps). I could find it on the network using BubbleUPnP as a renderer from my Android phone easily and I streamed Qobuz through it without a hitch.