Looking for a DAC that has..

In my estimation you should stay away from a dedicated preamp unless you have an analog source. Volume controls in the DAC have reached a level of quality where the days of the preamp will soon be numbered. We're at an inflextion point, DAC technology is one of the fastest improving in price performace. The machine you are looking for will be there soon within your price range. You will regret having bought an expensive preamp now if you do this. Don't forget additional cabling cost. Here is what I would do:

Get a good, but fully depreciated preamp with HT bypass. Run your Oppo 95 analog into the preamp.
Get a sychnro mesh on 30 day trial. See what sound quality you prefer: Oppo or Apple TV with synchro mesh and electro DAC. Keep the synchro meshif you like it.

Wait it out a little bit - when your ideal DAC has arrived at your pricepoint, sell the preamp (you'll lose a few hundred bucks tops if you buy at the right price). You can then run the synchro mesh and Oppo digitally into your new DAC.

Hi Steve and Edorr,
Thanks for the suggestion. Very intrigued by Synchro-Mesh.

I should have clarified this earlier. I do have a Pass XP-10 linestage that has HT bypass. As good as it sounds with XP-10 in the signal chain esp. in soundstaging (compared to Oppo 95 directly driving my Pass XA30.5 amp), it is not a bad idea for me to get a dac with performance close to XP-10 with HT bypass. I can always sell the XP-10 to finance the new dac purchase. This is not a must because I love the XP-10.

I do not plan to keep Electro ECD-1 dac nor Oppo-95 (esp. with 105 coming out soon). Initial thinking was to get SS mod for 95 from Modwright and sell the ECD-1, but it became clear that I cannot live with Oppo interface. So after reshuffling my priorities with the new knowledge shared by you..here's what I come up with.

A) AppleTV -> Sychro-Mesh -> DAC -> XP-10 linestage -> amps
Return oppo-95, upgrade the dac from ECD-1 to something like W4S dac2 (same sabre dac as oppo) and get the Synchro-Mesh.

B) AppleTV -> DAC with a reclocker -> XP-10 linestage -> amps
Return oppo-95, upgrade the dac from ECD-1 to something like Esoteric D-07, which is currently 50% off on Music Direct. D-07 seems to have a quality internal clock with dedicated power supply and its apodizing filter (not that I know what that is) that should reduce jitter from AppleTV.

C) Edorr suggestion: keep everything for now, add Synchro-Mesh, wait it out and decide later.

I'm favoring B a little at the moment, mainly because I can get D-07 for 50% off. I do not have to wait out for my ideal dac and I can add a passive switch for HT if I do decide to sell XP-10. Oppo+ECD-1 will help finance for D-07 purchase. Plus I will still have AppleTV interface. Please forgive me if I'm making this a lot more complicated than necessary. With limited budget and the desire to make the system flexible for future upgrade (mac mini or some music server), I cannot help but going back/forth with all these options.

Kz - Good luck finding a DAC with reclocking that actually works. I have modded 15 different DACs in the past. None of them were very good at reducing jitter. Remember, this is the most important part, more important than the DAC itself.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

Kz, I'm with Steve on this one. The Esoteric is not magically going to turn your mediocre digital source (Apple TV) into a good one. Going after a "good deal" in digital audio can be deceiving; price performance improves rapidly and if a DAC sells for 50% off is is usually because there are equivalent or better DACs for sale for half the MSRP.

Hi Steve and Edorr,
Excellent point. It gives me a lot more to think about. A quick google search on Esoteric D07 internal reclocking turned up pretty much nothing. Even the two reviews from Absolute Sound and Stereophile do not mention much about it. Maybe also because people that are using Esoteric would never even consider using mediocre source like AppleTV.

Anyway, one more development with Oppo-95. The unit just passed 600 hr burn-in mark last night and I'm quite in awe. I absolutely love the sound pairing with Pass Labs XA30.5 amp and XP-10 linestage. I do use the usb flash drive input (no moving parts, very short signal path from the drive to the sabre dac). I'm most impressed with mediocre apple lossless downloads from iTunes. I'm pretty sure I'm not delusional, but once it passed approximately 615 hr playing time, it transformed into something that punches way above $1k price point. (I do wonder how many people returned their Oppo without giving it a proper burn-in time. I listened to it for 4+ hr straight last night without getting any hint of listener fatigue with mostly mediocre recordings. It sounds smooth, detail, dynamic and very airy.

I'm still returning 95 I guess because 105 is coming out very soon (late 2012) and it'll have digital inputs to use 105 as a dac, which I can take advantage of with AppleTV + Synchro Mesh. Given Oppo track record, 105 should be better than 95. With this quality of sound at this price point, I should not care much for the interface (secretly hopeful Oppo improves its mediocre interface though).

During the meantime, I will sell my ECD-1 dac and maybe get a Synchro-Mesh.