Absolute top tier DAC for standard res Redbook CD

Josh - a short list is not easy. Tech changes so quickly it's hard to make a list of what to try.

Wisnon is obviously pretty happy with the performance of the Lampizator Golden Gate (although I think he has a Lampy 7). CTSooner and I are very happy with our ODSE DAC's. Many have reported good things about the newest version of the Bricasti M1 and the newest software upgrade of the PS Audio DAC. And Esoteric, MSB, DCS and such are always pumping out newer versions of their Uber dacs. The Chord DAVE is intriguing and the Rockna DAC I was recently made aware of looks pretty interesting as well. The Rowland Aeris was a sensational DAC when I had it also.

If there is one thing my trek has taught me is that if it interests you, you need to hear it for yourself in your system. It's the only way to really know. Not just hear it at a show or in a store, but in your system in your room. Dealers these days are typically happy to lend a piece of kit to you for a few days if you are sincere. Sometimes a deposit or payment in full with refund may be needed. It's worth it every time!

As a bias, if you are looking for PCM only to get the best damn red book you can, it will be touh to beat my little ODSE.

Hey Matt, did you ever get your Uptone Audio USB Regen? Have you tried it? What do you think?

Hi Matt- yes, my experience has been that hearing speakers or electronics in another system has little value. Gotta hear it at home and ideally for a decent stretch of time.

I'm looking to put a "short list" of CD/SACD players and stand alone DACs into the context of the design- delta sigma, R2R, etc. And then note for each the analog stage design, power supply or other important distinguishing engineering. Thought it might be a nice way to put them into some perspective and then see how it evolves over time.

-Josh

Yes. I got my Regen last week.
No, I haven't tried it yet.
Been crazy at work and have been practically obsessing about picking out my speaker.

I've had a crazy amount of speakers going through the room and seam to be narrowing it down nicely. My issue is that the pair I really really emotionally bond with are crazy expensive and the pair I'm comparing them with (which are exceptional but I can't quite seam to connect with as much) are way less expensive.

I still need to give the Vandy 7's another listen and have a few others I'm looking at. But the Marten Tenors grab my heart and my soul every time I put them back in the system.

Once I get that all settled I'll try the Regen and report. I also need to get that Bricasti M1 in to try. And I'd like to see if I can get John to bring over that Romulus Sig CD/DAC to try as well.

Well for starters Jh901 the top of the line MSB uses their own designed discrete version of R2R Ladder Multibit.

"MSB Sign Magnitude R2R DAC

MSB has always known the ladder was a superior conversion method and introduced the world’s first discrete 24 bit Sign Magnitude R2R Ladder DAC. The term Sign Magnitude describes the special architecture we use that dramatically improves the sound of low level signals. Instead of always starting at the lower limit of the signal and adding voltage to reach the music signal, we start at the midpoint, or zero crossing, where music is quiet, and we either add or subtract voltage to get the required signal. Because this requires a much smaller addition or subtraction on average, it can be done much more accurately.

MSB has designed and built a new proprietary R2R architecture that far exceeds the performance of the original ladder DAC design. The performance of a Ladder DAC is defined by the precision of the resistors. There are hundreds of very expensive aerospace grade resistors on each MSB module producing a DAC with a level of precision that is unheard of. The noise floor (the lowest sound that can reproduced), is much lower than most test systems can even measure. But most important to MUSIC rather than TEST SIGNALS, and very different from Delta Sigma DACs the MSB DAC module are most accurate with signals crossing zero, where music actually exists.

Sample Rates

When we talk about digital sample rate we mean the speed of the bits in kHz. CDs are 44.1 kHz (44.1 thousand times per second), and higher resolutions typically go up to 192 kHz with the next generation of hi-res recordings just now available at 384 kHz. MSB DAC modules can operate beyond 5 mHz (5 million times per second), so these modules can receive and reproduce all current formats and conceivable future formats for many years to come. Unlike Delta Sigma DACs the performance of the MSB ladder DAC actually gets better with more bit depth and recording resolution. Low level resolution is recovered to an extraordinary degree"

Cheers George