Why buy DAC with higher measurements?

[Svensson]

ASR reviews for DACs often capture "beyond hearing threshold'. We each are susceptible to psychoacoustics.
For amps, we select from measurements, power and use features.
For DACs in the 'Blue' zone of highly rated, why would we select one that has the higher cost, assuming features not relevant?

Would any DAC be superior to Topping E30 in the real world with ANY fixed system even if that system comprised of no cost spared best measuring source, amp, speakers etc?

 

[Killingbeans]

For DACs in the 'Blue' zone of highly rated, why would we select one that has the higher cost, assuming features not relevant?

Bragging rights. And a specific kind of FOMO.

Would any DAC be superior to Topping E30 in the real world with ANY fixed system even if that system comprised of no cost spared best measuring source, amp, speakers etc?

IMO, only if you factor in the effects you get from different kinds of cognitive bias. Whether that contribute to the concept of "superior" is up to you.

The greatest gift ASR has given me, is the comfort of allowing myself to not worry about certain things anymore. I really couldn't give less of a f##c about the performance of DACs at this point. If you do a pie chart showing the proportion of bottlenecks in an audio playback system, you'll struggle to make the contribution of DACs visible at all.

User-friendliness, customer support, reliability, efficiency, build quality, size, looks, functionality. That's what I care about these days.

If you want actual bang for the buck, focus on transducers.

 

[Mart68]

Would any DAC be superior to Topping E30 in the real world with ANY fixed system even if that system comprised of no cost spared best measuring source, amp, speakers etc?

There's currently no real evidence to suggest that the answer to that question is 'Yes.'

You might buy a more expensive DAC if you liked how it looked, the build quality, or it matched your other components visually (brand styling).

 

[Vini darko]

A dac with balanced connection may reduce noise. Also if dac is to be used as a pre-amp paying more for a lower noise floor may be worth it. Things like being able to fully control the dac from remote and unit is nice as is a built in power supply. Smsl D-6 seems like the best deal in dacs right now to me.

 

[FINFET]

Some merits I can think of:
- You can use a high SINAD DAC to measure your ADCs.
- Some pro audio guys want the damage from ADDAs as small as possible (need some loopbacks in send, return, analog summing, etc.)
- Good measurements may indicate good engineering.
- Buying devices with good measurements is my vote in the market to encourage manufacturers to make better tools not snake oil.

 

[Mnyb]

My 2c you really don’t need to upgrade DAC’s that can be learned here at ASR use the one you have until it fails or until you miss some input or other feature .

But if you need one pick a well measuring one of good design that have the features and inputs you need . And features and quality always wins over the last couple of dB’s imho.

 

[Svensson]

Thank you for responses. Without objective advantages, I see no reason to spend more, other than for reliability and actual use case features. Aesthetic reasons? Potentially, but equipment would need to be quite ugly (I am no heartbreaker myself).

 

[Dunring]

The best way to upgrade a Topping E30 is buy a Samsung ETA0U60JBE original not-fast charging phone charger and power it from that if your using a computer USB now. On ebay there's phone liquidators who sell them and they're as high rated as the Apple ones. Too many fake Apple ones unless you buy it direct from them. A balanced DAC will give more voltage to stay in low or medium gain longer. Other than that the E30 is a terrific DAC.

 

[Sokel]

If you use it as preamp too I would search for the one with the better SINAD vs level not the single best at 1Khz at full output.
Other than that most dacs used in dac mode (full output) will vary only if they have big differences in SINAD vs freq,etc results.

 

[antcollinet]

For DACs in the 'Blue' zone of highly rated, why would we select one that has the higher cost, assuming features not relevant?

I wouldn't. In fact I'd include the green zone in that and recommend that people select purely on features/build quality/price/after sales support etc, and completely ignore sound quality within that range until everything else is equal - with the proviso of preference for balanced connections (feature if you like but elminiating sound quality problems from ground loops)

 

[JSmith]

The question moreso is "why not buy a DAC that has excellent measurements"... rather than why. Cost is not an issue, as a well measuring DAC can be had cheap... a bit of headroom is a good idea too.


JSmith

 

[Snoopy]

Some people just like technology. Same like computer people might prefer amd or intel, Nvidia. Or apple Vs windows.

For me it's interesting that it's possible to archive something with different chips and power supplies. And all that stuff.

I'm sure more people are into these things or there wouldn't be case mods where you see the hardware inside cases.

It doesn't always have to be about getting the best result for the least amount of money.