I am an older DAC chip guy. I just finished a DAC design by Pedja that uses a TDA1541A Philips chip. The chip went out of production in or about 1995. I found and use the TDA1541AS2 chip (premium grade), a very hard chip to find. Another great older DAC chip is the Burr Brown PCM63. The PCM63K is Burr Brown's premium chip. Cd's are recorded in 44.1 khz and at 16 bits. This is all the info that in on a CD. A better circuit design and good DAC chip make a good DAC unit. Some older units are very good as well as newer designs, but there is still only 16 bits of info so an 18 bit-24 bit DAC chip will not get more info off a standard CD.
Anyway my choice is a newer design using and older DAC chip. Zanden is a company that does this at a very high cost.
Anyway my choice is a newer design using and older DAC chip. Zanden is a company that does this at a very high cost.