Absolute top tier DAC for standard res Redbook CD

Price can be everything, or nothing. (Oooh, that's deep!)

I don't judge a DAC on price or chip design. I believe that there are good delta Sigma DAC's and bad R2R's. It's the implementation, not the parts that make a DAC good, bad or great.

Most of the DAC's I considered where between $6500 and $14,000. I pushed up my audition prices more recently as my ODSX kept beating everything in that first price bracket. 

Some swear by the Emm Labs DAC2X. Others believe the Lampizator Golden Gate is it. Ayre, Merging Technologies, Playback Design, the new Bribkman, etc. All great. 

Dont discount system matching either. It's super important. 

All that said, Metrum has a great reputation but I am not familiar with it. Apologies. 

Hello

I have Metrum Pavane with Manley Shrimp (siemens NOS 60s tubes) pre and Audia Flight 100 amp. I got from a friend of mine Metrum Adagio just to test whether its better to go diectly from DAC with pre to amp. Probably i have an option to get Adagio by selling my Pavane, since my friend went to full AN system.

My observation (1 evening) tests that Adagio (comparing to Pavane/Tube Manley Shrimp) provides a lot more details, refines and cleanes the sound give more inside into layers and depth of the music. Is it hi-end sound? yes! do I like it? i ddidnt decide yet.

But in the same time I lost some tube magic and impact (guitar strings no more hit my body) and the bass is no more so scaled and full. No oomph at all.

I also find some mismatch of Adagio and Audia Flight.. i need to set vol knob to 12-13 to get the level of 8-9 of Manley Pre.. May be its not my cup of tea?

So my question is whether Adagio pre is so good? did anybody find the solution (pre) which is better that Adagio pre? I would have best of two worlds (adagio resolution and deatails) and tube pre body and impact

Thank you

Nitewullf 

There are two dacs which are awesome in that price range. 

One is the awesome T+A Dac 8DSD which for $4,200.00 is just plain outstanding, I know it is not a ladder dac but nonethess wow if you feed it via a computer with upsampled pcm to DSD 256 or 512 it produces a holographic, totally musica sound. 

This is the dac that we use most of the time when demoing our Legacy Signatures that you so love. 

The other is the Aqua Hifi Lasca  which we have a Demo that would make the piece affordable and that is a Ladder Dac, and it is also upgradable via replaceable boards.

The Aqua gear is just exceptionally musical and is very involving, with a liquid midrange as the La Scala uses tubes, the fact that Aqua offers up grades and is an evolving platform to me would make that dac very interesting compared to the Metrum which does make nice sounding musical products. http://www.aquahifi.com/la_scala.html


http://www.digitalaudioreview.net/2016/06/next-level-aqua-hifi-formula-la-scala-mkii-w-telefunken/

http://www.6moons.com/audioreviews2/aqua/1.html

Dave owner 
Audio Doctor

I have not heard the LaScala or the T&A, but both have great reputations. The Playback Designs Merlot is certainly worth hearing as well. 

And as long as DSD is not needed, the Empirical Overdrive SE is outrageously good!!! 

On the cheap end of Wow is the Axogal Comet and Chord Hugo 2/Hugo TT.

I chose to avoid tubes DAC's for my search, but they may be up your alley as well.

Find a few dealers you trust and spend a lot of time listening. It will pay off in the end. 

Matt, the Comet is from Exogal (formerly known as Wadia), and AQUA's top DAC, The Formula is SS w/o any valves.