USB DACs with 24/192 via USB

To the posters early in this thread that criticized the TAS article on USB for not including any Wavelength product, Wavelength may not have been included but it was not overlooked. This is what the writer had to say about Wavelength:

"When it came to selecting USB DACs for these sessions, my biggest challenge was narrowing the burgeoning field of candidates. In the end, I chose the Benchmark DAC1 Pre, Bryston's brand new BDA-1, the equally fresh Audio Research DAC7, and my trusty, Golden Ear Award-winning Resolution Audio Opus 21 stack. (Wavelength Audio, which builds intriguingly innovative USB DADs, unfortunately declined to particpate in these tests.)"

The conclusions of the survey may have been flawed by the absence of Wavelength but, at least in this case, TAS did not drop the ball.

Dougmc

Could you or someone else, post a link to that article, please?

Thanks.

Jim,

There are two problems in posting a link to the TAS article on USB DACs. First, the article appears in the current issue of TAS, and the magazine's website does not include content from its current issue. Second, I believe TAS posts only reviews of specific products, not surveys or articles of general interest, so I'm not sure if the article will ever be available on the website.

If you e-mail me off-line with your address, I'll send you copies of this article and the same author's review of the Bel Canto USB Link.

To all: Sorry for the typo in my previous post. Wavelength may be innovative, but it still designs DACs, not DADs.

I think you might be able to buy the issue as a .pdf online.

I'll encapsulate what the issue has to say via two reviewers, FWIW: USB is an inferior interface, even using the better USB>SPDIF converters (which in the one reviewers estimation amounted to the Bel Canto Link, per Johnnyb53 above). Reading the issue would probably have most folks here avoiding a USB DAC or converter and seeking out Firewire, or Wireless Network solutions (which were not really addressed in that issue, but IMO also clearly superior to USB). There are quite a large number of options out there to choose from in USB DAC's and accessories. The TAS issue only touched on a very small sampling. I also wonder how the introduction of a good dejitter device in the mix may have changed things. I find it interesting that Rankin refused to include Wavelength gear - didn't he used to write for one of the rags? Has he commented over on AA as to why he declined? Did anyone read Gilbert Yeung's response to Steven Stones article?

Jax2, interesting summary of the article. You've definitely got my interest and I will download a PDF copy. I'm not married to USB and would consider other options. I believe Opticis makes a 30 meter fiber optic Firewire cable that I could run from PC to DAC. The Weiss dacs look interesting for this.

I just noticed the Berkeley dac may have an HDMI interface in the future. This is cool (for me at least) for a few reasons: 1) I already have a 30m HDMI cable run, and 2) if the jitter is OK, then HDMI would be "perfect" because HDMI supports 24/192, DSD, and Blu-Ray (I can sense the eye rolls; Blu-Ray trickling in guys; just listened to my Neal Young box set last night on the Blu-Ray player).