??? Which Would You Buy ???


 So your in the market for a new component,amp,speakers,DAC,doesn't matter what it is...You have a budget of say $7500.00...You aren't made of $ & this amount represents a significant investment in time spent working & saving & will likely be the only upgrade you can make for the next several years...The rest of your system is good,what is considered mid level gear..
 After extensive research,time & money spent seeking out & demo'ing many choices you narrow your shortlist down to 3 different choices..2 of these choices are from well established manufacturers, have good reviews,sound very good in the demo environment & have excellent build quality but will max out your budget..
The third choice is 1/3 the price of the other 2,is a fairly new product & has limited but positive feedback on sound quality,comes from an established manufacturer that many high end manufacturers have sourced to build their products,has  very good build quality but not quite up to the level of the others & offers about 85% the sound quality of the others...
 Choosing item #3 saves you about $5000.00,meaning you could also upgrade another component or bank the savings...Which do you buy???
 

freediver

@bigtwin + 1 - buying the less expensive one and putting the saved $$ towards room treatment might be something to consider. If the room itself is bouncing sound around all over the place, nothing will sound as good as it should. 

Specifically with DACs, the differences are so minute, and preferences so fickle (depends on day of the week, air humidity, and what I had for lunch), I would definitely go with the cheaper one. As I mentioned before, I compared a $5K Holoaudio with a $250 Topping, and neither is objectively "better" across various genres of music and recordings. So you mainly pay for brand name and look. 

If you are a true audiophile (nut) you will never be satisfied for good enough. Go for whatever you think will sound the best, perhaps used?

Anyway, from there as funds accumulate you can then upgrade your other equipment.

ozzy

In my opinion, a component that only has 85% of the performance of the rest of the system leaves a lot to be desired.  If you save $5,000 for another upgrade, what do you upgrade?  The $2500 component is still the bottleneck.

I'd be more inclined to go with a component that offers 95% of the performance if it had a reasonable amount of savings opportunity.  That might be close enough.

Don't know if this is the answer the OP is looking for.  However, FWIW, in my experience over the last 50+ years or so, solid build quality (i.e.  reliability & longevity) and the best sound quality I can afford (i.e.  willing to pay for) are always my top priorities.  I always start with the headset of how much it's going to cost me to get something that sounds demonstrably better than what I have and then start demoing products around that price point.  Once I've established what I think is best within that price point, I then start demoing stuff at slightly and sometimes much higher price points to see/hear how much the extra dough will buy me.  I've virtually never stayed within whatever budget I've started with at any given time.  Once you reach a certain point in building a system, the costs for demonstrably improved sound quality become exponential.