dac recommendations for turntable listener?


hi everyone, kindly asking for your dac suggestions. im almost 100% a turntable listener, but recently picked up a DirectStream Dac for those times I cant find the vinyl, its too expensive, or it simply doesn't exist. im looking for suggestions as im not happy with the DirectStream dac, its just not to my liking. its too sharp up top, too thin in the lower midrange, other than that everything else is pretty great. id like to get, if possible, a dac that sounds more like my turntable. I feel like I would get mostly there if the midrange was fuller, and the top end was softer. 

my current system is marantz tt15 , dynavector 20x2, icon audio ps3 mk ii, primaluna prologue premium, and elysian 4 speakers. 

the current dacs I was looking to switch to were lab 12 dac, primaluna evo 100 dac, lampizators entry model, or Merason DAC 1. does anyone have experience with these and can recommend them? 

thanks a lot! 

Anthony 

128x128palutena

@audphile1 mostly laptop for streaming Qobuz, I tried Qobuz via Airplay just to test the optical with something other than cd player, and I actually preferred the sound this way. however its still night and day different compared to my turntable set up, I don't think ill be able to achieve the sound im looking for in my room by changing things like cables and transports/streamers. 

its certainly interesting you've had a very different experience than me, maybe due to differences in room, or perhaps personal tastes. I feel like your analogue setup of that caliber would blow away this dac in almost every way. 

I recently upgraded from a Schiit Gumby to the Merason Reuss DAC, which is their new mid-range, though hardly mid-priced DAC. I do not have experience with enough DAC’s to compare, but my overall description of the sound would be natural. A friend has the DAC1, and he has heard a lot of DAC’s, he is sticking with the Merason. I would give one a try. 
 

And they definitely support USB!

 

mostly laptop for streaming Qobuz, I tried Qobuz via Airplay just to test the optical with something other than cd player, and I actually preferred the sound this way. however its still night and day different compared to my turntable set up, I don’t think ill be able to achieve the sound im looking for in my room by changing things like cables and transports/streamers.

I respectfully disagree — you likely won’t be able to achieve the sound you’re looking for streaming from a laptop, or at the very least it will be a significant bottleneck and your cheap interconnects aren’t doing you any favors either. These things matter significantly in streaming just like every piece in an analog setup matters. So you can spend $$$ on something like a nice Lampizator DAC, but feeding it with your current setup would be an insult and counterproductive to achieving your goal.  The fact that you and @audphile1, who has a very good streaming setup, are hearing very different results from the same DAC tells you everything you need to know here.

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