Importance of clocking

@emergingsoul  +1. Any external clock will have to be connected by a cable (50 or 75Ohms) of course. This will cause smearing of the clock signal, it is not the frequency of the clock but the rise and fall times of the edges that are difficult to control without introducing several issues like overshoot/undershoot of the transitions (could cause more noise / jitter) and uncertainty (frequency / phase shift / linearity). In my book the clock source needs to be as close as possible to the DAC IC with proper PCB impedance control. An external clock source is required in a studio recording environment in order to sync several devices together.

@greg_f  

Thank you for the response but it's not helpful versus what I was trying to say. Doesn't really clarify the essence of what I was trying to say.

Seems to me a better Clock needs to be designed for inclusion within a dac. Adding a separate Clock and dealing with all the interconnects doesn't really help for something like this.  Better to deal with all the wiring within the component for a better clock. Do you disagree?

I‘d really appreciate if someone would comment on this thread from personal experience rather than from however acquired first principles. 

And by the way: your sophisticated views would obviate the setups of any major recording studio where clocking of multiple devices with very long cables is standard practice

@emergingsoul 

Perhaps I wasn't clear, I much much prefer a clock within the DAC than an external clock source. The better DACs have an extensive clock design. I believe something that separates a good DAC for a great one (both using the same DAC chip) is the (internal) clock circuitry, the power supply and the output stage of it.