Is there such a thing as a FOREVER DAC/streamer?

I think good powered speakers are going make all components start to look like relics from the past.  I’ve compared my Sonos internal dac to my mcintosh dac in the integrated to the Bryston bda 1 and it’s really hard for me to tell much of a difference.  I second whoever mentioned isolation, power supply, and output stage as being very important.  The work of converting digital to analog is about as start of art as it’s going to get IMO.  There’s a great system out there for any budget.

iPhone 7 streamer + Audioquest Cobalt DAC. Spectacular.

(Luxman LX-38 Ultimate Tube Integrated, Altec Model 18 speakers)

A dac that makes beautiful music today will make beautiful music 10 years from now as long as it is built with quality parts. The simple truth is that many people who have invested in a better dac mostly switch for the sake of trying something new or a slightly different flavor. 
 

Buy the best dac you can afford, pay special attention to build quality, and enjoy the music. 

*One casket says to the other casket, is that you coffin? 

Some might consider after all their past efforts there may come a time when you realize, sure that might be another incremental improvement - you sit back listen and think, meh...

All the best and a long life. 

*D. Martin to F. Sinatra

The length of "forever" is inversely proportional to how old you are. A great DAC bought now will still sound great 20 years from now, assuming the electronics and mechanical devices within it don’t age and change value or lose function over time.


It is best to look at our 2-channel stereo set ups as SYSTEMS. If I have a $10K stereo overall, the DAC I choose to get likely will be no more than whatever the "best" one is around $1000 to $2000.

It would be foolish of me to buy a $6000 DAC when my system (and my older ears) won’t be able to appreciably hear a significant difference.

It all depends on what you are chasing and how often you are mentally and financially willing to try catching it.

Technology will continue to improve to a certain extent. Today’s high-end DACs certainly are amazing devices, but that level of performance will eventually trickle down to cheaper ones and the difference between "good enough" and "great" will continue to narrow.

Think of HDTVs. Just 10 years ago OLED and other technologies cost a premium, but today QLED has caught up and even surpassed OLED, and prices have dropped tremendously. The march forward of technology is a great thing.

Consider that the current darlings of DACs, the R2R types are mostly made in communist China because manual labor is cheap there (like many of the popular tube amps requiring point to point wiring are). But imagine a company investing in automation to create high end DACs and do so in mass quantities. That might happen one day and then even the great unwashed out there who don’t even care about sound quality will have no way of avoiding it and actually hearing it.

It will just be the technical norm at that point.

As others have noted, just buy a good DAC, price commensurate to your system or thoughts on how far you plan to upgrade say in the next 5 to 10 years, and simply enjoy the music.  

Aside: Regarding "forever" I note that many of the Denafrips and other DACs use electrolytic capacitors in them. Should we be concerned about them drying out and changing value over time, like the ones in old speaker crossovers? IDK.