What outboard DAC do you use with Squeezebox?

[jbc]

I'm currently feeding my Linn Unidisk SC a steady stream of flac files via toslink, and it works fine. The performance is - to my ears - on par with playing the original disks in the Unidisk. As an aside, a second squeezebox feeds an analog signal to an older Rotel/B&W set-up in the kitchen/dining room, and that works fine too.

Seeing all the recent reviews of DAC's with asymmetric (apodizing) filters - like Ayre and Meridian - and hearing the new Linn DS units makes me think there's still potential room for improvement.

So, as a poll, what kind of outboard DAC do you use with your squeezeboxes?

Secondly, has anyone switched from 'my' setup to something else, and had an increase in performance? If so, what did you try?

Thanks,
JBC

[sleepysurf]

Currently using a Benchmark DAC into my Modwright pre. I'm quite happy with it, but would love to demo the Berkeley Audio DAC or Weiss DAC2/Minerva just for kicks.

[ralphpnj]

I have a Transporter, 2 Squeezebox Classics and one Squeezebox Receiver.

The Transporter uses the internal DAC

One Squeezebox Classic uses the internal DAC of my Marantz home theater receiver and sounds great.

The other Squeezebox Classic and the Squeezebox Receiver use the internal DACs in my two Headroom Desktop amps. One of these Headroom Desktop amps has Headrom's "Max" DAC in it and the other has the plain vanilla Desktop DAC in it. Both setups sound very nice.

I'm looking forward to picking up a Touch once they are finally released since all of my external DACs (the Marantz and both Headroom units) will work with a 24bit/96kHz digital input.

[Themis]

Northstar192, Caiman or the Denon's 3808 internal dac. Depending on my mood.
Caiman most of the time these days.

All good (or recent) dacs sound quite similar, to be honest.

[jbc]

Thanks for the replies.

So far, the two 'DAC's' that I've heard that I've been impressed with are the Linn DS units (not cheap!) and the Ayre C5Xe-MP. Maybe there isn't a cheaper way to get equivalent sound.

Thanks,
JBC

[Themis]

Maybe there isn't a cheaper way to get equivalent sound.

Plenty imho. I advice you not to spend more than 300$ on a recent, new dac.
Also, don't buy a second-hand dac that was made before year 2000, except if you know what you're doing.

[iPhone]

When using my Transporter, I use the internal DAC and the XLR Balanced outs.

Most of my Squeezeboxes use their internal DACs.

I feed an SB3 Toslink digital link to an Adcom GFR-700HD and it sound fairly good.

I feed a Dodson DA-217 MK2-D Digital Processor from either an SB3 or my Transporter Coax S/PDIF. This is a killer combination and sounds terrific (bit of over kill in my opinion and would not do it if I didn't already own the Dodson DA-217 MK2-D Digital Processor). The Dodson is the DAC that I used with my Esoteric CD Transport which I no longer need and have sold.

My only recommendation would be to use the Coax S/PDIF instead of the Toslink if you are looking for audio improvement.

[steveinaz]

I use a Benchmark DAC/PRE as both DAC and preamp for my system. Belden 1694A cables for interfacing.

I haven't purchased a Touch yet, but will when available. This will be connected thru the Benchmark as well.

[kwlinca]

I use a RWA-SB3 Classic into a TADAC 2009 (Siemens silver plate 12AU7s) into a Moscode 401HR amp.

[empty99]

from SB3 using optical link, just a touch warmer sounding than from CD player (Sony DVP-S9000ES) playback of same tune but in WAV format. I slightly prefer the 96k vs 192k (a touch softer focus) resampling rate setting (I suspect from resampling errors, i.e double vs quadruple)