New vs. old DACs - opinions?

Mofimadness, which ones were keepers out of curiosity?

I don't know... I've had a bunch of the older DACs like the Monarchy D22B, Parasound 2000, EAD 7000 II, and even had a EAD 9000 in my system for a while.

The EAD 9000 was the standout (and most expensive) of that lot, the others were good, but not "awesome" by any stretch. I also have an old CAL Ikon II, which only sounds good if plugged into my Monarchy Audio AC regenerator.

Then I had a Modwright Perpetual Tech P-1A and P-3A combo, a Bolder Cable modified ART/DIO, a Benchmark DAC-1, a Monarchy M24, and a Rega Apollo, all of which delivered great bang-for-the-buck and likely better high-frequency reproduction than any of the earlier units.

One of my friends has an older high-end Wadia DAC and another an antiquated Sony former top-of-the-line one-box player, and the high frequency performance of those pieces is dreadful to my ears, although the Wadia DAC presents very solid bass and great dynamics. But I couldn't live with either of those pieces long term.

The bottom line is that I don't miss any of the older gear. I would take the Rega Apollo (by itself or with the Monarchy M24), or the Benchmark DAC-1, over all of the previously mentioned gear, with the sole possible exception of the EAD-9000. Another current DAC that interests me, but I haven't heard, is the PS Audio Digital Link III and I believe PS is introducing another new model sometime soon.

Regardless of all of the above, I've been getting back to listening to my analog sources lately -- a renaissance of sorts -- and I'm digging it big time.

Just experience with one old and one new dac: the old PS Audio SL-3 and the much newer Northstar Design Model 192, which is capable of handling 24 bits/192 kHz. The difference between these two is, in my system with my ears, extremely small. If I knew then what I know now, I would have kept the PS Audio and spend the money on something else.

in my auditioning, i listened to older dacs and the newer dacs, and the ones in my price range (< $5k), i preferred the older dacs. i have or have had audio research, manley, classe, cal audio, audio alchemy, and the adcom 600 & 700 dacs in my systems. i still have 3 of these in my systems today. i have listened to the newer 24/192 dacs, and have owned cd players with that capability, but just because they have 24/192 capability, it doesn't necessarily mean they are better sounding.

The generalization either way is flawed. As always, it depends on implementation, some old dacs sound better than some new dacs and vice versa.