Best DAC question.

[kflynt]

Hello.

I have a Marantz PM 6005 amp and a Focusrite Saffire PRO 24 audio interface.

I was wondering which DAC between those two would be a better choice to send my digital signal to.

In other words, which one has the best DAC chip?

Thanks.

 

[MajorFubar]

The best one is the one which sounds best when you plug your digital signal into it. And no that's not supposed to be a smart-arsed answer, it's the right answer, because there's no other way to tell. And if you can't tell the difference between the two when you listen, probably just use the Marantz to reduce your box-count clutter.

 

[kflynt]

Thank you for your reply!

 

[drummerman]

Can't add much to Fubi and Vlad, they are both right of course. All subjective.

As to measurement, short of expensive specialist units such as the ones from Chord which use their own codex on FPGA's rather than off the shelf chips the best performing DAC's on paper are probably from ESS (Sabre Hyperstream), varying slightly depending on models.

You can find them on even relatively cheap electronics.

Still, manufacturers using them quite frequently 'compromise' their full ability for whatever reason, subjective listening tests probably being one, less than ideal engineering solutions as regards to output stage in others.

Then there are 'legacy' (older) chips, still used in surprisingly expensive products which also review well but may not measure as good as the latest and greatest.

Some of the performance of the latest 'super chips' is probably more important in theory than practise as the material which would test their ability is either not available or very patchy. Add the hardware, amplifier and speakers to fully exploit them and the cost could be very high.

It's a jungle out there

 

[Vladimir]

The best one is the one which sounds best when you plug your digital signal into it. And no that's not supposed to be a smart-arsed answer, it's the right answer, because there's no other way to tell. And if you can't tell the difference between the two when you listen, probably just use the Marantz to reduce your box-count clutter.

To find out which one sounds best, the procedure is simple, plug it in and listen.

To find out which DAC chip is best in technical terms, open the spec sheets and compare. But there is more to a DAC circuit than just the DAC chip, therefore gazing at those numbers is pointless. As we often experience in this hobby, worse measuring can be better sounding. Back to option 1, pluging it in.