No such thing as a future proof DAC...

"most newer DACs seem to miss the mark when it comes to naturalness of timbre, pace and rhythm, and smoother sound compared to the older ladder DAC chips and some NOS designs."

Absolutely agree. Its due to the digital filtering. If one could use a modern D/A converter, but eliminate the digital filtering, you would have the best of both worlds: resolution and smoothness. Its possible.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

I agree, there really isn't with the exception of MSB Labs. I bought their Link DAC years ago and upgraded it a couple of times before finally selling it. They are top company to deal with, but their current products are pretty pricey. Great company though.

I think we shouldn't forget about the source feeding these future proof DACs with xxxBit / xxxKhz capable components. We should also not forget the limitations of human hearing when considering the next purchase of said DAC.

Seeing that the record companies and artists are just now starting to re-release their past albums in 24bit/96/192khz format sourced from master tapes of the same quality or less I think the picture starts to become more clear how far you really NEED to go.

We humans are a silly species. Here we are 10-20 years in the future of the release date of most of our favorite albums and we strive to create/attain 32/64bit DACs with triple digit processing capabilities that are far beyond the capabilities of the original equipment used to capture the event in the first place.

In my opinion the main problem with using these increasingly more intelligent brains (ie..DAC's) is that they tend to highlight the shortcomings of the chain of components used to capture these original events. This is of course assuming were are not talking about a modern day recording that was captured with a modern day DAC. At least in that case we could next focus our attention on figuring out how to upgrade a humans hearing capabilities to REALLY enjoy this level of equipment.

DACs are about as future proof as computers.

If you want something future proof, buy a turntable.

"Future Proof" is simply marketing. As others have already pointed out, simply being able to replace a board doesn't mean there's going to be one made to do it.

And yes, there are big differences in DACs, age being a consideration, along with implementation before and after it (probably the most important and least talked about because its not as sexy as whats the best DAC chipset and how many bits: its like the old horsepower wars with cars-those ratings were quite misleading but it made for great copy and people fell for it by the truckload, and still do).