Back to the DAC

@worldwidewholesales

Great post with great advice-and it is commendable you didn’t give any specific manufacturer’s names. There is a good chance I will never in my life listen to 10% of the components you have,

I am curious if you could share what your current 3 demo songs are for your comparisons?

I wish more folks would realize and admit this is a journey of preferences.

It’s not a cage match of bests.

@tvad exactly. Which brings me to....

I do not recommend the Weiss, dry and hard compared to the others.

Dry and hard? I guess to my ears all the other DAC’s are too fat and slow?

As to cabling, I am using lower cost digital cabling from my transport (step above Blue Jeans which is very neutral and a steal at $35) similar to the Westminster Labs lower end digital cable.

Might be a contributing factor to a less than perfect audition?

I would most highly recommend one of the upper-end Ayre Acoustics DACs.  I find that the Ayre Acoustics DACs have a beautifully natural, super high resolution,  organic, smooth, extremely dynamic, detailed and transparent signature sound.  I have the Ayre QX-5 Twenty DAC with the built-in streamer, but I believe these can be had without the streamer.  After auditioning several other reference DACs, all costing more than the Qx-5 Twenty, I chose the Ayre.  After auditioning the QX-5 Twenty DAC, I felt that it offered everything I needed in a reference quality sounding DAC, and that there was no need to send more for anything else.  Happy listening.       

@kennymacc Ayre makes great stuff, glad you found your game!

@mclinnguy +1

@tshark did ya get it figured out?

@audphile1 +2

@fleschler - hysteve? CD player? Did I miss something?

One thing I just wanted to throw out there. I really think my Gustard R26 is the choke point in the system. I had a $200 Onkyo CD player that sounded on par with the R26 (running coaxial direct into the pre-amp) and when I hooked up the Aurender N200 (through the R26) I didn't really here much of a sound improvement. So, I am really hoping the now, Bricasti M1 Series II will elevate things. I also just saw a Bricasti M12 come up on USAM for not much more that I'm going to put into the M1...darn!

OK, I guess that's good then.