MSB select II vs all dacs ?

Hi mikelavigne,

At any point did you hear me say Rockna was the best or put any other manufacture down? I think if you read my post very carefully you will read this is exactly what we do not want to get involved in.

There is no intent hear except to say "lots of good dacs" and sorry if you want to make it sound other wise. It does not matter if the person is in the audio industry or not, we should be allowed to have an educated opinion. Nothing that we said was hypothetical but rather based on real experience. 

Cheers and lets not side track this whole thing.

Bob Visintainer here- I’ve been quoted many times in this thread. Here are the facts-

-I had the MSB Select II for six months with one power base and Femto 33 Clock. It was the best digital that I had ever heard.

-I got in a CEC $33K Dac. I put it in my system and was completely satisfied, I did not feel I needed the expensive MSB any longer.

-I then got the Rockna Dac, same thing happened. It was $11K and I did not miss the CEC. I sold the CEC.

-I also was using the Rocka Server. The combination was/is excellent especially with the I2s interface using an In-Akustik usb cable.

-Then after a few months I ended up getting a Taiko Audio Extreme server. The price of the Extreme is $25K compared to the $9100 Rockna server. Is there a difference? To me there is MUCH more of a difference in my systems inserting the Extreme server than changing the different DACs. There should be a difference the Extreme is almost 3X the cost of the Rockna server. I still think the Rockna server and DAC are excellent at their price points. I could live with them and enjoy digital easily with this combination.

-At the present time my reference is the Extreme server with an Intona Ultimate USB cable into an Intona 3.0usb isolator with another Intona ultimate usb cable into an Aqua Formula xHD DAC with the latest analog output board.

In no way did I do a direct comparison between the MSB, CEC and Rockna DAC. What I did what go from one to the next to the next and never missed the one prior or felt like going back. Although right now I am enjoying the AF xHD but again it’s twice the cost of the Rockna DAC.

In addition Rhapsody.Audio is no longer a Rockna dealer.  We are focusing on the Taiko Audio Extreme server as well as the Aqua Formula Dacs.  

The Rockna products are excellent products for the $$$ and anyone can't go wrong in choosing them for a digital solution.

Any questions please just ask.

Bob V.

@rhapsody   Bob, thank you for your post and allowing us to follow the digital breadcrumbs. : )

Very helpful and clear. Thanks!

Thank you David!

Rhapsody I’ve been following this topic thanks for chiming in , I guess like most here I generally find topics of this sort highly interesting though the majority is way outside my price bracket.

You suggest prominence on the source / network server over the dac i wholeheartedly agree keeping with my old school thought on similar topics.