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Bluesound Vault 2i, with external DAC and hi-end CD player

In trying to get rid of the thousand physical CDs i own so I demoed the Bluesound Vault 2i against my Theta Miles CD player (with a Krell integrated amp and Thiel speakers.) The Theta produced better sound so I sent back the vault. Someone suggested that I use an external DAC, like the Chord Electronics Quest DAC, with the Vault 2i to produce the quality of my CD player. Has anyone any experience with this scenario?
llarry
pdreher's avatar
pdreher
1,200 posts
 
I own the Bluesound Vault 2, connected to the DAC of an Audio Aero Capitol Reference CDP.  While I've found the Bluesound definitely benefits from an external DAC, the cd's ripped to the Vault don't sound as good as cd's played direct from my CDP.
llarry OP
41 posts
 
Very sorry to have posted this in the wrong section. I am a newbie I didn’t know. I will take Tomcy6’s advice and move it. 
llarry OP
41 posts
 
Tomcy6... sorry but I could not figure out your instructions.I Open my profile but could not find any thing about “topics“. A little more help would be much appreciated.
jl35
3,966 posts
 
a better DAC will help the vault, but only so far

bluemoodriver
193 posts
 
I have a Node2i and it is easy to do A/B tests because all its outputs are hot. I found a small preference for using coax out to an external dac (the one built into my amp) over RCA out of the Node - but I couldn’t tell if that was because of the different cables or because of the different dacs. I keep reading about the amazing difference cables can make, so, you know...
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