DAC that beat Mark levinson 360s ??

I doubt if you'll find a more musical and accurate DAC for that or twice the price, of course everything is system dependent, and I like and enjoy listening to THETA equipment too. Being familiar with Audio Research and this companie's reputation for being musical, I'll bet you can find one of these in your price range also, but I'm unsure if they make/made a 24/96khz DAC.

Winsound.
I own a ML 37 and 36s.What I would do is to keep the 360s and get a 31 or 31.5 Transport.If you sell the 37 and take the $3000 you are willing to spend onthe DAC you should have enough for a used 31 or 31.5.To change the 360s to get 24/192 -I wouldn't!Spend the most on the transport,the 31 and 31.5 are pretty serious stuff !!
All the best
Chris

Since your transport is only capable of outputting 16/44.1kHz, why do you think you need a 24/192kHz-capable DAC to go with it?

is it all transport read at 16/44khz and then up sample to 24/96khz or 24/192khz for cd. so the better DAC ( 24/192khz) will provide better sound