Sweet Sounding DAC

MSB Premier DAC with renderer.

Border Patrol owner here. I got mine to bypass the internal DAC on my Bluesound Node2. 

I find it has a nice soundstage and when the tube rectification is kicked in, it’s even better. Vocals are enchanting. 

On the downside, it’s pretty limited in features but if you can live with that, it’s worth a listen. 

Happy Listening. 

Playback Design, Low Fatigue, Smooth. easy on the ears

Or If you want a Rich Smooth sound Aries Cerat

DCS is super Analytical,Precise and tiring to listen too,.

MSB sounds better than DCS in most cases but over time it is still Analytical thou over DCS its smoother and easier to listen too.

This search started as a need to find a smaller DAC and streamer due to overcrowding in my cabinet. Current players Bricasti M3 and M5. But as I started looking and listening, I realized there is a sonic search as well; just to complicate the process. As much as I like the Bricasti gear, I have always yearned for a softer- perhaps more tube/ analogue sound.

op

since mid 2020 i have tried over 40 dacs in my system (now nearing 50), at various cost levels, learned a ton in the process as i have committed to streaming music in my system going forward

please check out my past posts answering varying queries like this on dac recommendations

of the ones you listed i have only had/heard a minority - here are my takeaways

-- border patrol... smooth, rolled off $1000 dac, mediocre overall, with a below average level of insight, air, or drive, probably one of the weakest on your list

-- audio mirror tubador ... i had the 3se, one gen prior to vlad’s latest, which i am sure has improved incrementally... a nice sounding dac, sweet rich and analog sounding, but had some issues with sibilance in my system, overall a fairly good value used at ~2000

-- audio note kit 4.1 - very nice sounding, lively yet rich, dynamic, holographic... but lots of tubes inside, truly gargantuan box, input card has limitations (only up to 96k sampling rate), if you can stand a refrigerator sized dac with zero features the sound is unimpeachable

-- i also had a bricasti m1 se mdx and i concur it is a truly excellent clean modern sounding dac, tonally accurate very precise open airy sounding but not overtly warm/rich in presentation per se (i liked the linear 2 filter setting best iirc)

for what sonics you seek, as you describe it i would suggest

-- denafrips pontus (rich tone, good detail and air, very slight grain, but still very very nice), for 1500

-- cambridge cxn v2 modded by modwright with tube output stage - beautiful sound, sweet yet dynamic, quite well focused, lovely tube magic at play here, nla modded new due to parts issues, but they do appear used occasionally

-- mhdt r2r tube buffered dac with upgraded tubes (we 2c51, or old stock 6dj8 via tube adapter) -- 80-85% of the modded cambridge but half the $$

-- msb analog dac with power base (lovely sounding, very appropriately named) - uber refined sweet treble yet at the same time airy open holographic good focus... $$$ but worth it, newer even more expensive msb’s are more modern precise sounding, which i do not prefer

i currently own and enjoy all of these mentioned, among a few others with a more ’modern’ sound