Best mid priced DAC for use with Cal Audio CL 15?

I don't know if it is within your budget, but I just bought a Sony SCD-777ES, not the XA777ES. My system has evolved to the point that it was REALLY showing the digital harshness of the Cal. BTW, see your other thread about cables I posted some suggestions for you there as well.

The transport is less critical in my opinion then the dac and digital cable. One of the best tube dacs are the older Audio Logic 34s that you can find for around $1000 depending on the chip set inside. They can be modified by the manufacturer to current standards if you want. The AL 34 dac has 4 tubes with a separate power supply. The better the tubes, the better the sound. This DAC is better then the original Cal Alpha DAC but go with the non 24/96 version of the CAL Alpha dac. If you find an AL DAC, make sure you do a search on Agon for Audio Logic and what digital cables everyone is using, there are plenty of AL fans here on Agon.

Happy Listening.

After I read the Cal manual and discovered it had no digital output I discovered my Panasonic DVD-H1000D has one. So now I'm wondering if I could use this machine as a transport and implement a DAC for 2 channel use. I'm looking for the best sound and don't really need both machines unless it's unavoidable. Again any feedback is appreciated.

I have the cal cl-15 for about eight months.In my case using an aftermarket powercord made a big improvement,interconnects are also very important.I also tried to use the cal as a dac only using a lowend Pioneer cd recorder and Audio Alchemy dti jitter reducer to feed its coaxial input,and it actually sounded cleaner to my ears,a dedicated transport would probably sound even better.Try using the Cal as a dac and tell us what you think,and this dac has remote controlled digital volume which is not a common feature,so you can hook it up directly to a power amp.
Another options is to change the player´s clock for jitter reduction.I wonder if anyone has tried it on this player as it seems a very popular upgrade with other cd players
e.g. LC AUDIO and TRICHORD make these kind of high precision clocks to improve any player.I am thinking of trying this myself
Just my 2 cents