MSB DAC IV or dCS Paganini

Kops,

It is interesting to note the vast disparity in listening experience where the MSB is concerned. But if you have more people auditioning with you and they all came to the same conclusion, then I would go with your conclusion. Guess I'll stick to dCS.

Jon

I've owned the Paganini stack driven by an Esoteric rubidium clock as well as the Elgar Plus stack, the P03D03 etc. I would say that the Esoteric and dCS approach things differently and would not say that the Paganini is superior. The British unit does have tremendous detail retrieval and a clean, fast, dry sound and nice bass. The Esoteric has (if one upsamples CD to DSD) more diffuse sound, nice midbass and a projects a more palpable image. I have never heard any MSB gear.

MSB will be at RMAF this year. Should be intersting to see the Diamond DAC in person?

I have been considering the dcs debussy for cd's, dvd's and sat radio. Anyone have excperiance using dac with sat radio and dvd's(blu-ray)? Big improvement? Not much at all? At some point I would use for a computor based system. thanks

I output the digital from my Oppo BDP and from my Esoteric UX1 to my Boulder DAC and find it exceptional. I also have tried the HDMI digital into my Denon AVPA1 and that works fine for movies and, of course, provides multiple channel output and subwoofer control. I think the Blu Ray into DAC is an excellent and simplified solution worth considering. DVDs are improved relative to most players (my UX1 is very good); given the bitrate, the sound quality and picture are noticeably inferior to Blu Ray. With movies and in multichannel, if what is on screen is compelling, I don't pay any attention to the sound quality per se, just the effects and dialog clarity.