What solid state dac is similar to Ayre CX-5e?


I have recently aution a few system on my trip to New York. After comparing a few cd player, I felt Ayre's sonic attributes would suit me the best. I would buy it now if I want a cd player.

My recent experiment with PC audio was a great success and confirmed that PC audio is the way to go. The convinience of PC interface simply make me listen to more music! Therefore, I need a dac instead of a cd player.

My system consists of the following:
Aesthetix Calypso preamp
Art Diavolo amp
Audio Note speakers

I would like to focus my search for a solid state Dac as the few tube dacs (Audio Note, Wavelength, and MHDT )I tried was too much of a good thing in my full tube system.

I really Ayre sound as I thought it was very neutral in a way that no frequency range stand out. I could not detect any noticable charateristics. It is refreshing that all of the cds i play all sound different. Of course, all of the tube units I tried sounded more "beautiful" especially at the dealer's all solid state system.

I hope I have provided enough information for you to make recommendation. My budget would be in the same ball park as the Ayre.
Thanks

Here
kentchai
There are a few firewire interfaces available. I went with the M Audio Firewire Solo - $200 and awesome for me. It takes a firewire cable from my PC and has an spdif output (into a monarchy upsampler into MF X DAC). Firewire much better for passing audio as it does so in a stream, as oposed to USB which uses packets. USB was never intended to stream audio. It was intended to connect peripherials.

I had extensively auditioned the Ayre with the Esoteric X-03 SE and I felt the Esoteric has better retrieval of low level detail, more air around the instruments and a wider-deeper soundstage. The did both do a great job and didn't sound very different at first, but after about 5 hours of listening, the Esoteric became my preference. I felt the Esoteric brought me into the music as opposed to the Ayer, which brought the presnetation of the music to me. The D-05 had a tad wider and deeper soundstage than the X-03 SE (the dac was hooked up to an X03 SE as a transport). On the Stereophile recording, The Mooch, the Esoteric reproduced the music and the venue itself. I had never experienced this before on a CD. With Chesky's Rebecca Pidgeon, Spanish Harlem, the D 05 was slightly more holographic than the X-03 SE -

I would settle for an X-03 only Dac if there was one (I don't believe there is) which is why I am considering the D05 for my squeezebox (replacing the Benchmark).
there are 2 dacs you should definitely check out that are in your price range. Both the Berkeley Audio Alpha Dac and the Weiss Engineering Minerva are getting rave reviews and are approx 5 grand each. the guys who designed the Berkeley were responsible for the Pacific Microsonics Model 2 - one of the greatest dacs ever. Robert Harley has stated on the Forum of avguide.com that the Berkeley is the best front-end he's ever heard in his system.
the minerva just got a great review in soundstage.com. also, it does fire-wire which supposedly takes it's performance to another level.
Good luck.
Maxx2man,

Could you please describe the sound characteristic of the Berkeley Dac, since you have been playing with one? I could not find any review online as it is a new product. Have you heard an Ayre, a comparison will be awesome here?

The Weiss look really interesting, I am going to look into it.

Cerrot,

Thanks. Your description of the esoteric is very helpful. I need to look up the price for D05 to make sure i can afford it:-)

Thanks.
The next product Ayre is producing is a USB dac. There's a lot of info, including the upcoming -R series source on AA.