When Will the DAC Singularity Be Reached?

Exactly right ...Thanks to say it clearly..

What I don't understand is why some are so attached to this idea that to get the basic function right, it must take a lot of money?  Filters, tube output stages, and I am sure many more ways exist to create a differentiated sound. Attractive cases, nice displays, added functionality. So many ways to differentiate your product. Why the need to insist getting the basics right is expensive?

Cin Dyment: we both know very well you never owned such DACs. You don’t own any audio system. Maybe in your rhetoric trolling the audiophiles you hate so much, lies.

Sorry for the threadjack but....

Wait, THIS guy is all over the audio Facebook groups saying he has some long history of commercial audio experience, former director at Sony Electronics, went to Harvard, Berkeley, Tufts, and Rensselear...and he just...MADE IT ALL UP???

Man, if so, that dude is a piece of WORK.

Also, I have three DAC's...and even though it's limited to redbook, the Sonic Frontiers SFL-2 mkii sounds pretty damn good with those Ultra Analog DAC chips.

It's "smoother" than my Gustard X-26 Pro and compares favorably (read musical) to my Spring 2 KTE (which I recently sold to upgrade to a Holo Audio May).

@othercrazycanuck +1

THIS:

I used to be on the equipment ferris wheel, going around and around and around. Maybe equipment roulette is more fitting? This DAC, that DAC, this cartridge, that cartridge, amps, etc. Never quite happy.

Once I learned all the nuances of speakers in a room, got appropriate speakers, subs, and fixed my room, then I finally got off the equipment merry go round. All those changes I thought I was making, that never seemed to quite do it, were not doing anything. I have easily spend over $20K on DACs over the last decade. Now every DAC in my main system sounds good.

Maybe I am the man out in this discussion, but I would rather be happy and confident in my system than yearn for yet another lateral change.

Because of my journey, like the op, I question the value of expensive DACs. They may be different but different is not better, it is different. Maybe that works for you, maybe it does not. It is working for some people here, but I wonder what are they putting a bandaid over.

(and definitely not this, which has never been glibly true, and could be argued is actually the opposite of true when it comes to 'the nature of advancement'):  "Low cost DACs will sound like low end DACs and high end DACs will continue to sound way better. It is the nature of advancement."

and he just...MADE IT ALL UP???

Man, if so, that dude is a piece of WORK.

Yup!

I can confirm that DACS can sound different.  The one in my Onkyo 7030 is warm and somewhat polite,  If I go coax into my high end - ahem - Fosi Audio DAC 05 the sound becomes more clear with better highs.

I also just had a SMSR and Topping DAC in the five hundred buck range, and returned them both.  No better than the Fosi 05.  

Personally I would rather spend the money on records.  They sound better and are just more fun for me.