Upgrade from Benchmark Dac?


The Benchmark USB DAC is the first piece of digital gear that I've bought and been happy with. I still prefer analog but listening to 50,000+ wav files randomly is pretty sweet.

I've had an Audio Research DAC 3 as well as a CD1 which I thought sounded like crap. I have ARC electronics and love them but their digital offerings left me cold. On the value for money scale the Benchmark gets my highest rating although my local hifi emporiums claim the PS Audio or Bryston is better.

Anything out there in the digital world that will blow me away like the Benchmark? I don't want to spend ten times the dough to get a debatable 10% more "sound".
ntscdan
I use an inexpensive Monster Power bar filter as Shadorne described on my system. It is the only special power conditioning solution in play and seems to do the job quite well in my case. All digital sources and pre-amp are powered from it (not the power amp). The digital sound is clean, tight, detailed and focused. Not sure what more I would gain with anything else, though it would be interesting to experiment.
4est, this in some haste: associated gear identical for all trials. Transport : Sonic Frontiers, AC cord : Ensemble Powerflux, digital IC : Atlas Opus, analog IC : Audience Au24, pre/power : GamuT, speakers : Gradient Revolution.

Material was world jazz ( Hadouk Trio-Live à FiP ), classical ( Beethoven 6th-Haitink LSO, Boccherini quintet-Europa Galante, an aria I've forgotten the name of ) and rock ( the XRCD Brothers in Arms ).

The great advantage was to the Stellavox in the upper mids and highs. More air, less hash/starch/chalkiness. The big thing for me was cymbals sounding like metal. Clarity also was better across the entire range.
I have to agree that tweaking the benchmark makes a big difference. I have changed the usb cord, vibration/support, pc (blacksands) and dont forget the fuse. I think it sounds better straight from the wall than out of my lowly APC unit.

Certainly well worth the effort if you already own it. What will I upgrade to? That's a $50 question but I am eagerly awaiting the Ayre dac.

Cheers