Are there digital front ends with the body...

As surprising as this may be I agree with Tvad and Mrtennis.

Mrtennis, for me, best is a live performance, preferably unamplified. I have this favorite local jazz trio playing in a nice restaurant for Sunday brunch. It is very noisy on Sundays but I went there on a week day and recorded the piano player live. My brother knows how to play acoustic guitar so I recorded him too. I did this so I can recreate the live performance as close as I can with my audio system. If you can have a natural and realistic reproduction of a piano, guitar and violin, with all details, resolution and natural decay, then your system is indeed “the best”.

In order to properly evaluate my digital players, I have designed and built the rest of my audio system. It is not for sale, it is for a reference.

Regards,
Alex

Tvad, you are absolutely correct. This is why I am always recording my vinyl to CD and DVD-A and A-B in real time with my digital. According to the ears of local audiophiles on a recent test, the digital sounded preferable to my vinyl. We used the direct-to-disc Bassface Swing Trio "Plays Gershwin" and its SACD copy. And the 45rpm Patricia Barber "Nightclub" on Mo-Fi and its SACD copy.

Regards,
Alex

I have a Forsell Transport hooked to an EAD 7000 DAC, the upgrade bug bit me recently, so I tested a bunch of DACs on my system, none were even close, Chord (closer), DCS (good detail,annoying hiss), AN (lower model), Accuphase (nice tone, missing bass), etc.... Of course I have my system highly tuned for this DAC (my own horn speakers and passive attenuator) so I guess that had something to do with it...
Anyway this setup kills my mediocre Analog rig.