Would an external DAC improve the sound of my SONY

Thanks for the kind words, Maril555. Sorry to say that I've not used a MCH SACD player much as a transport enough to give any suggestions, but maybe if you started a new thread on the subject you'll find someone who can suggest something in your price range. I've read of many folks not too happy with most DVD based SACD and Universal machines as a transport when compared to dedicated CD transports, so there may not be much hope short of going with Esoteric or Krell. From a recent audition I would add that the MF dac and even the MF CDpre24 is shockingly close to the Krell SACD Standards' sound on redbook, a really close battle overall, if that tells you anything.

If you can tolerate another box in the rack, a Theta Jade or Peal comes highly reccomended with this dac, or even the cheap Basic mates up very nicely. I'm strongly of the mind that the transport should be of the same quality (and usually near the same cost) as the dac attached to it; that both pieces are equally important for good sound. Good luck!

Since the Sony SACD units are widely modded at reasonable cost this may yeild better value sonic upgrade for less money. SACD Mods has nice upgrade package for $328:

http://www.sacdmods.com/

External Dac would also help but I think you get more bang for the buck doing mod.

Also remember if you get external Dac you have extra expense of another good AC cord, digital cable, and extra shelf space.

My question is now this: since I'm probably going to use Sony 999ES as a transport for Red Book playback with MF3 24 DAC, would doing the mods improve " garbage, coming out of the digital output" as was suggested by Socrates earlier in this thread. Or, should I forget about using Sony as transport, and just go ahead and modify it. And how one would compare MF3 24 DAC performance against, let's say Modwright first level mod? The price is not an issue, the Red Book performance is. I know, this horse has been beaten to death already, but still I want to know your opinions anyway. Regards.

If money is not a concern, you may want to take a step back and reevaluate where you're at and where you want to be. Don't get stuck on what you have currently, look around, don't limit yourself. I'm highly skeptical of mods, personally, so will leave that matter to others, though I do have more then my fair share of cdp/sacdp/dac experience to offer, if you'd like to hear it.

Personally, having owned the Sony (ho-hum) and the MF dac (great with a great transport), I'd say, if you have the money and desire to approach SOTA sound for around $3-4K (used), toss the Sony and the A324 dac and buy the Esoteric DV50. Alternatively, trade in your A324 dac towards the crazy good Trivisat 21 Dac and connect it to a Marantz DV8400 if you must keep a SACD/DVD player as a transport, which I'm told by a few friends with great dacs (Chord64, Electrocomapnient, Kora and the MF21 dac) that it is a very good transport, better then any other DVD based player they have heard (many) and competitive with dedicated transports under $2k. That's all hearsay, so don't hold me to it, but you can find other accounts of the 8400 being a solid transport in the AA archives, if that helps.

That all said, I personally grew very annoyed with the SACD software situation, sold my SACD players and have been playing with Wadia's, Cary's, Consonance and upper end Musical Fidelity CDP's lately in the same ~$2k price range as the better SACD players (talking used here, mostly). No suprise here, the redbook from the CD only machines is quite a bit better overall. Now, don't get me wrong; I love SACD sound, it's a significant upgrade over redbook, but I have only ~50 sacd's, of which I play less then a dozen with any frequency, yet have countless hundreds of CD's and all of the new music I enjoy have little prayer of ever hitting SACD, so a good cd player just made more sense to me....