Which DACs are known to be sweet/rich/relaxed?

Frozen1976

you said a mouthful

I’ve fought the rock issue of brightness since I had Thiel Speakers ,very revealing , and metal tweeters

The more revealing your speakers with all solid state, especially , the rock becomes tough to accept.

You have a “wow” setup ,with the focal evo’s, especially revealing 

Anyway, I’m especially happy now with tonal balance for old rock.

my top rock album brightness reducers: 

1) run Roon and convert to DSD files,vs pcm

2) went to CJ ET3 preamp ,and rolled tube 

3) Used pre to amp IC to Cardas Parsec 

4)Adjust sub woofer to BBC bump at 100 hz with 6-9 db bump (100-250 hz warms up tonal balance - can do in Roon esp)

good luck

jeff

In my experience - the transport is where it’s at - DAC comes second. With a better transport comes a better sound and edginess becomes less and less. My guess is that your DAC has much much more potential.

In my very recent experience I connected (or a competent dealer did) my cheap and somewhat edgy Metrum Octave DAC into a Grimm Audio MU1 digital front end - this totally transformed the Metrum for the better.

In a similar fashion I also fronted my DAC with a dCS Network Bridge which again took the edginess of my DAC (in fact DACs - I also have an AN 0.1x).

If I were in your shoes - I would certainly - without doubt - upgrade your transport and not your DAC.

Or, just go buy a dCS Rossini APEX (DAC and streamer) and be done with it! That thing sounds stunning.

Robert1976

per my previous response

make sure you do the easy stuff, first 

tonal balance is a big thing and easy to do with Roon dsp

so, is converting files to dsd , in roon

i tried playback design dac in my system and was astounded how sweet that was ,but expensive

then, I tried dsd conversation with Chord dac, dsd is the way to go for rock albums of 80’s 

jeff

@cleeds 

Why are you protecting a supplier from obvious dubious claims to the detriment of the thread? That is political behavior not rational behavior.