Cheap vs expensive DAC?

I find DACs have quite a difference but I couldn't necessarily tell you what was "better" i.e. more accurate and less noise in anything that is moderately well designed or better. Anything based off legacy Burr-Brown designs tends to have what I call a "90s sound" for want of a better way to describe it - some call it warm but it isn't really - kind of slightly dark, smoothed (without necessarily losing detail) sound whereas for instance ESS based DACs tend to be slightly bright, brittle with a more clinical sound. A lot then depends on the circuitry around them - PCM and CS, etc. DACs with cheap and cheerful general purpose capacitors, etc. tend to sound dull even when they test well synthetically and have high SNR, etc. performance.

It isn't necessarily about the cost of them - for a lot of people it will be subjective based on what distortion sounds more agreeable to them.
 
All depends. The sound will vary on the digital techniques used, the analogue and the physical components - including over temperature and input/output impedances. Then there's the question - will you like the sound?

A cheap DAC is often a cheaper, older, DAC IC coupled with cheap components (ie lax tolerances, fake brand caps etc, high ripple power supply etc) with a simple design that focuses on cheap manufacture. Even things such as non-polar caps being not installed the right way for lowest noise. That same cheap DAC IC could sound decent given a decent design and normal components.

Expensive DACs - or more precisely DACs built with sound in mind, take the later technology with stringent selection criteria and pair with low noise designs, tighter tolerances and component matching, additional components for reducing noise from ripple etc. Sometimes that's as simple as having additional PCB layers, thicker layering, or larger PCB (space reduces interference) that requires a bigger box.

If you look at a discrete 24bit ladder DAC, you'll start seeing that the tolerances for the lowest bits (smallest variances in sound) have to be extremely low - 0.01% resistors and at that level you're looking at temperature effect on stability, matching the resistors for balance (0.01% still has variances). However at the same time, the size of the number of people that could hear that difference drops.

The majority of $ nowadays goes into the digital side, reducing the digital noise and improving the reproduction of the analogue sound once converted into digital imperfectly.

I'm looking at DSD512 next. That's a 1bit sample but at a rate 512x a CD rate. The benefits are DAC noise is shifted way up.. into the MHz range that can be filtered out, the rate allows for more accurate slew rate (although 1bit at a time) and the final thing - the DAC conversion process is literally an ongoing average sum of either full power or zero power (no finniky tolerance issues) with a simple low pass filter to remove the inaudible DAC noise (it can cause problems with audio equipment). It's so simple that someone actually designed a non-chip vacuum tube DSD512 DAC which I'm currently adapting the design to play analogue and DSD512.
However converting from analogue to DSD still has the same issues - people not converting 'natively', mixing/editing at a lower rate etc etc - so in the end a high cost or low cost.. if you put crap in..
 
Nick,
Some good points well made.
I do find it interesting when threads on DACs focus on purely the chip, when that’s only a part of the story. The clock, output stage and power supplies seemingly being if anything, more important.

A good example being one of the older Wadia players that I heard a couple of years ago. Pretty ancient chip, but sounded glorious.
 
Rroff said:
I find DACs have quite a difference but I couldn't necessarily tell you what was "better"
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For me it's as though every instrument has been given it's own space like I'm in the room with the band.
A good example is that people talked about Jon Bonham's bass drum pedal squeaking and I had never heard it since first listening to Led Zeppelin in 1970, when I had my DAC I heard it. I also heard parts I'd never noticed before.
 
Like Mr Sukebe said the chip or method of conversion is largely irrelevant it's how you implement it that makes the difference. A good dac from 10 years ago will still be a good dac today.
 
I've got an irdac from Arcam. It's burr brown based. It cost £400. Its significantly better than most DACS built into AVRs and far better than the Sonos DAC which made me laugh out loud how bad it was.

Having said that and from reading I wouldn't go much over £4-500 for a DAC.

TBH if they are giving you some magical new presentation to music they are just colouring the sound in a post processing kind of way.

Most DACS are using off the shelf chips packaged differently.
 
Mr_Sukebe said:
The diminishing returns comments are an interesting point, and to a degree, I'm in agreement.
All the same, if you're genuinely interested, it's worth putting a little time and effort in to hear some really good gear. Most dealers are very enthusiastic about showing off their kit, and there's also the better "enthusiast" shows, such as Scalford.
I believe that it helped me to better understand just what I was getting, even if I couldn't afford some of the real top end gear. So with bit of time, I've managed to hear some really good gear from groups including Linn, Naim, Mark Levinson, Esoteric, DCS, Wadia, Meridian, Mckintosh. So whilst my "preferences" on sonic presentation might well be different to others, at least I'm comfortable with understanding what I've got for the dosh, and what's possible.
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Some of the brands you have listed there really do have a sonic presentation. As a former owner of DCS, Mark levinson (seperates), Emm Labs presents the sound in the way a manufacturer voices them or how they think you would enjoy them. is one better than the other at that price point I am not so sure. The DCS and Emm Labs were sonically closer and technically accurate. In fact I have never heard any dac get close to what the DCS does as far as tonal accuracy, balance between the frequency extremes yet for some reason I preferred the ML. It was darker sounding than either the DCS or Emm Labs. The Emm labs was breathtaking as well but ultimately I found it fatiguing. But that was a long time ago and I have since sold them a long time ago as well.
 
NickK said:
All depends. The sound will vary on the digital techniques used, the analogue and the physical components - including over temperature and input/output impedances. Then there's the question - will you like the sound?

A cheap DAC is often a cheaper, older, DAC IC coupled with cheap components (ie lax tolerances, fake brand caps etc, high ripple power supply etc) with a simple design that focuses on cheap manufacture. Even things such as non-polar caps being not installed the right way for lowest noise. That same cheap DAC IC could sound decent given a decent design and normal components.

Expensive DACs - or more precisely DACs built with sound in mind, take the later technology with stringent selection criteria and pair with low noise designs, tighter tolerances and component matching, additional components for reducing noise from ripple etc. Sometimes that's as simple as having additional PCB layers, thicker layering, or larger PCB (space reduces interference) that requires a bigger box.

If you look at a discrete 24bit ladder DAC, you'll start seeing that the tolerances for the lowest bits (smallest variances in sound) have to be extremely low - 0.01% resistors and at that level you're looking at temperature effect on stability, matching the resistors for balance (0.01% still has variances). However at the same time, the size of the number of people that could hear that difference drops.

The majority of $ nowadays goes into the digital side, reducing the digital noise and improving the reproduction of the analogue sound once converted into digital imperfectly.

I'm looking at DSD512 next. That's a 1bit sample but at a rate 512x a CD rate. The benefits are DAC noise is shifted way up.. into the MHz range that can be filtered out, the rate allows for more accurate slew rate (although 1bit at a time) and the final thing - the DAC conversion process is literally an ongoing average sum of either full power or zero power (no finniky tolerance issues) with a simple low pass filter to remove the inaudible DAC noise (it can cause problems with audio equipment). It's so simple that someone actually designed a non-chip vacuum tube DSD512 DAC which I'm currently adapting the design to play analogue and DSD512.
However converting from analogue to DSD still has the same issues - people not converting 'natively', mixing/editing at a lower rate etc etc - so in the end a high cost or low cost.. if you put crap in..
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Yeah - I was messing about a bit with the PCM2902 - commonly found in many mainstream audio devices especially embedded/integrated paired up with general purpose parts, etc. sticking some precision metal film resistors, Nichicon caps, etc. using a decent little regulator chip (LP2951 IIRC but it has been awhile) to drive the voltage on the analogue side into a pair of OPA1692s completely transforms it from what you get from common implementations and I suspect some would be unable to tell the difference from very expensive gear blind testing unless they were aware of and sensitive to the slight issues around 1KHz.
 
I've had a couple of Dacs over the last few years - Starting with a Cambridge Dacmagic then moving to a Audiolab Dac mini and then to my current one a Chord 2Qute dac (precursor to the qutest which I managed to pick up at £300). Very distinct difference in quality each time. However I would say you need the audio system to really notice it. Without the supporting system there's little point in going far up the cost chain for DACs as you'll not not really hear the difference and it is a bit of diminishing returns (I've hear the qutest on my own system and it's better than the 2qute but to me not twice the price different over the 2qute (around £500 quid 2nd hand now)
 
I recently bought a cheap chinese dac - Topping E30. Its a brilliant bit of kit, sounds great. Sadly, i think i prefer it to the dac in my hifi rack, a top end ad1865n-k valve dac.

Listening to it now through a valve headphone amp (Siemens C3G parafeed DIY jobby if you are wondering). with senn 650s and tidal flac.... superb
 
Psycho Sonny said:
It's not snake oil but there is a ceiling of where it becomes pointless spending more.

A £5 DAC Vs a £300 DAC there will be a difference in sound quality.

A £300 DAC Vs a £1500 DAC there will be a minimal difference and tbh your whole chain will need to be top end to even appreciate what the £1500 DAC is capable of. No point running a £30 amp or £200 speakers for instance and using magnetic tape as the source material.

There is a point where yes every product has pretty much hit it's peak and pointless spending more.

As in spending £50 on decent copper cabling is fine but there are people who will spend £500 on cabling which just isn't necessary unless you are wiring a proper cinema or music studio.

Much like a £15 hdmi cable from a reputable brand will be just as good as a £500 hdmi cable.

Wasn't there someone on here who spent £1000 on a cable? I remember them posting a link to the cable they had bought and I was shocked.

It's not snake oil until you hit the law of diminishing returns. Buying a decent DAC therefore isn't snake oil.
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I was listening to an interesting podcast on cables and in that they actually mentioned recording studios and the fact they didn't use any fancy "blessed by the Pope" cables just ones that were good enough. Conversely I've heard of people with extremely high end systems spending $100k on cabling. There is a lot of snake oil, look up Lotus HiFi and grounding boxes https://www.lotushifi.co.uk/portfolio-items/entreq-grounding-boxes/ upto £6,600 for a wooden box with sand in it :eek: You are correct about diminishing returns and matching your system. I know I'm not that discerning and have recently purchased some Wharfdale EVO 4.2 speakers, which even with an old amp sound very good but once I can afford a decent AV receiver will sound better. I probably wouldn't get the value out of a system any higher end, besides which as you get higher end the sound of your room becomes more critical if you want to get the most out of your investment.
 
=XDC=FluphyBunny said:
The audiophile industry is a laughing stock. One way electricity and £130 fuses lol

Don’t get caught up on the snake oil bs.
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I've seen those cables where they test them and see which way it sounds better! There are also services that will paly white noise down your cables to condition them or something :rolleyes: I thought computing attracted some strange ideas but audio is on another level.
 
Considering the cables end up connecting to a public mains supply..

good line conditioning filter (ie block EMI and maintain stability) to prevent the +/-10% for mains 230 is all you need at the top end..
 
It’s largely BS especially when it comes to headphones. The accepted wisdom is pretty much that there is no point buying either a dedicated DAC or amp unless your inbuilt DAC is **** (and yes, pretty much every audio device has a DAC) or your headphones aren’t being driven well enough.

There is a site which aims to scientifically measure DACs, amps etc and the £9 usb-c to 3.5mm converter which has a DAC inside measures really really well to the point where the human ear is not capable of hearing the ranges that it falls short in for the most part.

If you are driving high impedance headphones or super sensitive IEMs then you will need an amp for that and most of the high end amps are trying to quite literally get out of the way and drive the headphones without clouding the sound from your source.

When you are talking of tube amps, they are distorting and clouding the sound. That’s not to say that that doesn’t sound better to your ears but objectively it’s degrading the signal. This is literally the crux of high end audio and why you will read 50 reviews and 40 will say something is amazing and worth every penny of the £500 and £10 that say it’s revolutionised their lives.

If your phone has a crap DAC inside that y doesn’t drive your headphones properly and you buy a £500 DAC and amp you will probably be amazed. If you had bought a £30 amp and a £9 apple converter with inbuilt DAC you would probably have the same outcome or something very very similar. If you don’t do the latter though you will gush about the former.

The hifi industry is full of shills and people who have a vested interest in a high turnover of equipment and the people always hunting for that special sound.

The truth is that you could take two self proclaimed audiophiles and they could have drastically different views on what sounds good.
 
DACs absolutely make a difference (enough audio charts out there that scientifically prove this) but the misconception of price = quality does not apply. You can get great DACs for very little money.
 
fez said:
There is a site which aims to scientifically measure DACs, amps etc and the £9 usb-c to 3.5mm converter which has a DAC inside measures really really well to the point where the human ear is not capable of hearing the ranges that it falls short in for the most part.
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All very well but the apple dongle is limited to 1vrms output for the US version and the EU version is even worse @ 0.5vrms. As a dac with a built in HP amp driving a pair of sensitive earphones, it's brilliant, but outside of that...not so much. Ideally i'd want a 2vrms line out, 0.5v isn't enough.
 
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