LaLaLard
Member
Hi all,
We now live in an era in which people -those who know how to spend money- are spoiled by reasonably priced but well-performing equipments.
I've tries quite some well-engineered versatile DACs over the year and am now settled with RME. In the last 5 years or so, there had been a lot of Chinese brand of Hifi equipment, mainly aimed at students and young workforce, making good-valued products that suits their taste.
So instead of giant heatsink and overkilled transformer, these brands have nicely added some much more useful features into their products, such as Bluetooth and USB input, which wasn't all that common before they entered the market.
I recalled prior to 2010 I was using Creative 1212M soundcard with Logitech transporter, through Coaxial, for my PC hifi. Back then there were lots of criticism against ANY PC hifi but I'm glad to see this hatred is now gone. Due to the small number of PC hifier, back then, there wasn't many option with USB at all, let alone to any reasonably priced ones(apogee got USB but the price back then...)
Now DACs have not only all adapted to USB input, but many also DSD processing, IIS input. And it is no longer just a DAC, I've bypassed preamp for many years now without any issue. The sound is so clean.
Folks, what would you like to see on a resonably priced (<800USD) DAC now? Talking about low level of distortion seems irrelevant now, given that a well-engineered product could easily go above 110db SINAD.
Personally I would like to see RME making their next ADI with these feature:
Some options just to get the discussion started:
We now live in an era in which people -those who know how to spend money- are spoiled by reasonably priced but well-performing equipments.
I've tries quite some well-engineered versatile DACs over the year and am now settled with RME. In the last 5 years or so, there had been a lot of Chinese brand of Hifi equipment, mainly aimed at students and young workforce, making good-valued products that suits their taste.
So instead of giant heatsink and overkilled transformer, these brands have nicely added some much more useful features into their products, such as Bluetooth and USB input, which wasn't all that common before they entered the market.
I recalled prior to 2010 I was using Creative 1212M soundcard with Logitech transporter, through Coaxial, for my PC hifi. Back then there were lots of criticism against ANY PC hifi but I'm glad to see this hatred is now gone. Due to the small number of PC hifier, back then, there wasn't many option with USB at all, let alone to any reasonably priced ones(apogee got USB but the price back then...)
Now DACs have not only all adapted to USB input, but many also DSD processing, IIS input. And it is no longer just a DAC, I've bypassed preamp for many years now without any issue. The sound is so clean.
Folks, what would you like to see on a resonably priced (<800USD) DAC now? Talking about low level of distortion seems irrelevant now, given that a well-engineered product could easily go above 110db SINAD.
Personally I would like to see RME making their next ADI with these feature:
- Bluetooth. This can be very handy when you need it.
- FIR&IIR filter support, which means you could upload your filter ONTO the DAC. Currently, I'm suffering from the need for EQ with my HD800. I'm limited to use my MAC to play music as ADI-2's EQ isn't comprehensive enough to save the dire Frequency response of HD800...
Some options just to get the discussion started:
- Bluetooth (at least 5.0) support
- Aptx-HD, LDAC
- Low latency mode (good for games and movie)
- EQ
- IIR filter support
- FIR filter support
- Firmware upgrade
- Digital out option
- Digital in -> processed (e.g. EQ, upsampling .etc) -> Digital out
- Headphone out (not required for a DAC but definitely nice to have, and one less set of plugs+cable means less jitter anyway)
- XLR plug output
- 3.5mm output
- Phono Stage (SMSL A8 has it, but are people on this forum still use turntables?)
Last edited: