What the benifit of using a separate dac?

Shadorne
well, OK, it is... it's just not the very first thing.

I just had to validate performance is the higher priority for me always.

With all my junk residing in an adjacent room, only the loudspeakers get much face time. They need to be unblemished of course... or have unobtrusive shortcomings.

The more I think about it I think I am more prone to pick of the same items being sold, the one with the less usage over the one with the better appearance though. Usually.

It would come down to just how much savings I could get off the normal sale price and just how big, or what type of a descrepency it was.

I believe that's a pretty natural way of making a buying decision. But trust me here on this, I really don't get a kick out of simply looking at any of my gear except for one thing.... that 120 DIY HT screen when watching TV or DVDs.

That sole item has been for me a real blessing... despite the crap I went through to get it all up and running... and it ain't even tweaked in yet.

I do get a little kick out of what others say when I let them see the Thor and the rest of the tube gear, sometimes though as predominately they all think it's antiques. The Thor gets the most acclaim as a rule... with the usual line of "What in the world is that thing?"

I just tell 'em it's a pretty nice used car, or a long weekend in Hawaii.

Your reply sounded superbly utilitarian and pragmatic until you let that slip in! LOL aesthetics is important after all! I 'll admit I am just as guilty of that as the next guy ;-)

I guess I ain't "the next guy": I don't give a tinker's cuss what the thing looks like if it performs well. This is ironic considering I'm in the visual arts and am a very visual person. It's all about whatever serves the music for me. If it happens to be ugly I'll put it behind cabinet doors (most of my system is - though I'm sure many would consider those things beautiful). Most of what I see in audio design is pretty boring visually as far as I'm concerned - most of what others here consider beautiful just looks like yet another variation on billet boxes with blue lights. The only designer I'd consider an exception to that is Electronluv, but I cannot afford Josh's stuff. If I could, it would be out for all to see.

FWIW - Alex Peychev of APL HiFi is NOT a "modder" in the sense of the others mentioned above. He guts the component, save for the transport and display connections, etc. and replaces everything with his OWN DESIGNS - clock, different and more DACS from AKM, output stage, etc. That's what he did with my Denon 3910 and what he does with the Esoteric transports. This is a very important distinction and is in fact exactly what DOES separate him from the "modders".

My 3910 bears NO sonic relation to what it used to sound like prior to Alex's rebuild - it is totally different machine, but in the same box and with the same crappy transport.(nobody's perfect...)

As far as Alex being AWOL, he should be back this weekend and explained his absence on the APL HiFi forum several weeks ago. A number of us have also received e-mails from him about ongoing projects.

He will be building a separate DAC for myself and probably a number of others, for many of the reasons stated above.

My 3910 bears NO sonic relation to what it used to sound like prior to Alex's rebuild - it is totally different machine, but in the same box and with the same crappy transport.(nobody's perfect...)

A good friend had an APL 3910. I spent a couple of days at his place listening to various music I was very familiar with. It sounded great. I never heard a stock unit, but it sure didn't sound like any $1k stock player I've ever heard.

As far as Alex being AWOL, he should be back this weekend and explained his absence on the APL HiFi forum several weeks ago. A number of us have also received e-mails from him about ongoing projects.

Glad to hear it. Since most folks here are not likely on the APL forum why don't you share his post here (or the gist of it). There have been a few posts on A'gon and AA that indicated there were folks who had been waiting for their modified players for quite some time, and that his customer relations person had to leave for health reasons. Good to hear he's on his way back - seems like he's very talented at what he does.