I’ve been using the onboard dac in my Hegel H390 after discovering my Aqua LaVoce was introducing fatigue. The Hegel’s AKM based dac sounds pretty good but I lost both detail and bass reach/definition in the process and would like to find a dac that restored these while still remaining musical/organic. If funds become available, this will be my top priority. I’ll be looking for a used Bricasti M3, Merason DAC1, Mojo Mystique XSE.

Although I just recently declared myself done with upgrades, I have been contemplating upgrading my Denafrips Pontus II DAC to the Pontus 15th generation DAC. After reading that the new Pontus 15 is essentially a Venus 12th generation, this upgrade is now on my radar for 2025. The Venus sold for nearly double the cost of a Pontus and was beyond my budget at the time. Just curious if anyone has taken this leap and if they feel it’s worth the upgrade. 

Ebonized tiger maple racks--on the production schedule for 2025

Here's one--the other will be for turntable only--How gorgeous is this?

Well crud--pic was stripped--how do you paste one in?

Innuos zenith NG !