Some DACs I am Considering-Any thoughts?

@georgehifi just curious have YOU actually heard each of these dacs or are YOU basing your views on build and chip sets?

Well, I own the AM Tubadour III. I did not get the SE model however did get the capacitor/ resistor and USB power supply upgrades. Cost was $1900. The stock version is $1500 and can be upgraded at a later date. Love this DAC.

I can't comment on these. I have the MHDT Orchid and I love it. What I will say is that based on what I've read and heard, you (OP) have compiled an excellent and selective list. Well done!

I can't comment on the models you mentioned, as I have not heard them in any setting.   But I will say, never but never buy a DAC that is not 32 bit / 384KHz compatible, has a Femto Clock with very low jitter, and can handle any format shoved into it.  The reason is if you get something other than the above, it will become obsolete in a few years and all that cash you spent becomes, well, "so yesterday".    Trust me; been there, done that, got the T-shirt!

I have the Doge 7 DAC and it’s quite good, to the point where I’m surprised it hasn’t garnered much of a following. I have it rolled with NOS tubes and it is very warm, liquid and images really well. I’m an analog guy so I go for DACs that reproduces the things I like about analog.

I can’t compare it to the others although I do have a little bit of GAS for those R2R DACs which supposedly are very analog-sounding.

If you go with the Doge the one tip I’ll give is that it sounds much better to upsample all PCM music to DSD - i suspect it’s because it has a CMOS chip that converts all incoming PCM signal to DSD since the ESS chipset is a delta-sigma DAC. Roon does this easily and it made a big improvement.