How old is too old for a Dac?

there is a fair amount of recent research into noise injection

I am not clear on whether the engineers think that an optical of WiFi connection solves those problems or not

I'd bet you could find a new DAC that sounds better than one from ~~8 years ago even on redbook... the problem is to find one

@ redmosessc

Interesting story. Glad you were able to take that risk and win big. And it really says something about old vs new tech. 

The Redgum sounding very good doesn’t surprise me.  Solid engineering principles are to a large degree timeless.  Well thought out robust power supply and  quality analog output stage are essential to obtain upper tier sound performance. 
Charles 

Great find redmosessc!  A lot of great older used DAcs available for one playing redbook cd files and owning a good USB/SPDIF converter. I currently own four non USB DACs and two converters. 

@ charles1dad

Makes sense. Though not sure how one would go about discerning one from another unless one happened to be privy to the materials used.