DAC recommendation in 5 to 10K range
I recently get to the point that I want to try a new DAC in $5 to $10K range and would like to know if there are recommendations I should try and audition.
My current DAC is a Denafrips Terminator, to me, Terminator is an overall fun DAC that provide good clarity, energy, and scale. It has strong macrodynamic focus with good impact and punch, as well as solid resolving power and texture, but I feel drawback is lacking micro dynamic capability, tonality is not organic, neither is presentation, treble is not that refined, and can sometimes get too hot and gritty. What I hope in my next DAC is a balanced DAC that lean a bit more toward the relaxed and slightly sweeter smoother side of things, great organicness, great placement accuracy and depth in overall stage, great coherency and liquidity, as well as having great impact and punch.
Wow...lots of good suggestions. I don't think I can audition them all, but certainly will check into them further.
@gkr7007 , I do have a limitation in shelf height, the maximum height I can arrange is around 22cm or 8.5 inches, in talking to Lukasz, he suggest I look into an Amber 4 with "hot-rodded" tube section, that will perform very close to a Baltic 3, and this will likely be the one I will try if I end up heading this direction.
Meanwhile, T+A is very high on my list also.
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@Bigby Completely agree! I was auditioning multiple new DACs to replace my PSAudio Directstream when I decided to go with both the Edcor transformer upgrade and the JKRichards Analog Board replacement. |
