thyristor44 Posted October 4, 2014 Share Posted October 4, 2014 Hello At the moment I am using a borrowed Quad 99 cd/dac as my dac. Its not bad but I need to return it and get a dac of my own. Other thing is I havent much cash and they are about £250 uk. I could go up to around £400. I have a quad 34/401 amp, wharfedale 159 speakers, marantz cd6005 and denon fm tuner (radio 3 fm is brilliant), usb to optical convertor. Anyone any recommendations. Thanks thyristor44 Link to comment
boatheelmusic Posted October 6, 2014 Share Posted October 6, 2014 Take a look at the Emotiva DC-1. great features, performance (dual AD 1955 chips), and the price can't be beat. they sometimes have demo units with full warranty for even less. Link to comment
mac_and_dac Posted October 6, 2014 Share Posted October 6, 2014 150 GBP should get you an original second-hand CA Azur DacMagic off e-bay. I've still got mine, and can't part with it because it offers so much bang per buck. Three filter settings to play with too :-) Front End: Neet Airstream Digital Processing: Chord Hugo M-Scaler DAC: Chord Dave Amplification: Cyrus Mono x300 Signatures Speakers: Kudos Titan T88 Link to comment
cutterfilm Posted October 11, 2014 Share Posted October 11, 2014 I'm looking into the DacMagic Plus, too. I'm also considering the more upscale Bel Canto Dac 2.5. I have a W4S DAC2 for my main system, but I need to upgrade my work system. I want to feed a volume controlled XLR signal to a pair of bi-amped monitors and to run headphones from it too. Both of these DACs fit the bill. I need to find places near me where I can listen to them. The Emotiva is an interesting option, but I've never heard any of their stuff. Link to comment
thyristor44 Posted October 11, 2014 Author Share Posted October 11, 2014 Bel Canto Dac 2.5 much too expensive for me thats why I am interested in the Dacmagic plus Link to comment
Picklgreen Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 Arcam irDac. Little more than the cambride but worlds better sound quality! Link to comment
sctubes Posted October 26, 2014 Share Posted October 26, 2014 I have the DacMagic Plus, for almost two years. It's solid and I never had a problem with it. Sadly I don't have another DAC to compare it to, but it is a major upgrade from using the computer audio output, which is what I used before I had it. It is connected to an old MacBook on one hand and to Dynaudio Contour 5.4 via a PrimaLuna Dialog preamp and monoblocks on the other. Funnily I am on this forum today to try and figure out whether it is time to replace it with something higher end. Link to comment
thyristor44 Posted October 26, 2014 Author Share Posted October 26, 2014 I have now borrowed a dacmagic plus and your right its not bad. I found the volume control a bit of a fiddly, having to turn it up every time. Also it wasnt discernably any better than my £30 muse dac from china either. I will have to try a better one next time. Thanks for the replies mates. thyristor44 Link to comment
sctubes Posted October 26, 2014 Share Posted October 26, 2014 The volume control can be disabled if you don't plug directly into a power amp. Link to comment
sasbyte Posted October 26, 2014 Share Posted October 26, 2014 i can hardly hear differences in dacs. recently had dacmagic plus and benchmark dac 2 in my mcintosh rig. the differences were very minimal. also compared dacmagic plus to my old nakamichi cd player. very little differences. Link to comment
sctubes Posted October 26, 2014 Share Posted October 26, 2014 i can hardly hear differences in dacs. recently had dacmagic plus and benchmark dac 2 in my mcintosh rig. the differences were very minimal. also compared dacmagic plus to my old nakamichi cd player. very little differences. sasbyte - I tend to agree with you. The single biggest improvement to my system, as far as playing digital music and by a long stretch, was Amarra. Adding a DAC did make an additional improvement to the sound from the computer. Similar to what you note, I experimented with a cheap, 10+ year old, Sony DVD player, where I connected the audio output to the preamp and the digital output via the DAC and switched between the two. There was some difference, but very marginal and hardly worth worrying about. Link to comment
grinccaffe Posted March 15, 2015 Share Posted March 15, 2015 I have the DacMagic Plus, for almost two years. It's solid and I never had a problem with it. Sadly I don't have another DAC to compare it to, but it is a major upgrade from using the computer audio output, which is what I used before I had it. It is connected to an old MacBook on one hand and to Dynaudio Contour 5.4 via a PrimaLuna Dialog preamp and monoblocks on the other. Funnily I am on this forum today to try and figure out whether it is time to replace it with something higher end. Hi, Greetings from Croatia! I need help about installing CA DacMagic Plus with Foobar2000. CA is set in USB mode 2. ASIO CA is the main output. Led lamp is always standing in the same position 44.1 khz, even though playing the record 19.2 khz. Foobar shows 19.2 khz but not DacMagic Plus. At the forum I read that I need to install Foobar component foo_out_asio.zip (version 1.2.7). This component can not be found anywhere, the download link. Please help. Hello everyone, Damir Link to comment
EuroDriver Posted March 18, 2015 Share Posted March 18, 2015 Hi, Greetings from Croatia! I need help about installing CA DacMagic Plus with Foobar2000. CA is set in USB mode 2. ASIO CA is the main output. Led lamp is always standing in the same position 44.1 khz, even though playing the record 19.2 khz. Foobar shows 19.2 khz but not DacMagic Plus. At the forum I read that I need to install Foobar component foo_out_asio.zip (version 1.2.7). This component can not be found anywhere, the download link. Please help. Hello everyone, Damir It's been a long time since I installed Foobar. I think this may be the page link to component you need foobar2000: Components Repository - ASIO support Sound Test, Monaco Consultant to Sound Galleries Monaco, and Taiko Audio Holland e-mail [email protected] Link to comment
grinccaffe Posted March 18, 2015 Share Posted March 18, 2015 It's been a long time since I installed Foobar. I think this may be the page link to component you need foobar2000: Components Repository - ASIO support I already have that component in Foobar. http://prntscr.com/6hfikx http://prntscr.com/6hfhox http://prntscr.com/6hfj6t Link to comment
EuroDriver Posted March 18, 2015 Share Posted March 18, 2015 I already have that component in Foobar.http://prntscr.com/6hfikx http://prntscr.com/6hfhox http://prntscr.com/6hfj6t the Foobar screenshots look good to me ! May be the CADMP does not show the relevant led ;-) I would trust Foobar to be correctly reporting the sample rate Sound Test, Monaco Consultant to Sound Galleries Monaco, and Taiko Audio Holland e-mail [email protected] Link to comment
grinccaffe Posted March 18, 2015 Share Posted March 18, 2015 the Foobar screenshots look good to me ! May be the CADMP does not show the relevant led ;-) I would trust Foobar to be correctly reporting the sample rate Hello good people, Problem solved :) My street vocabulary, Foobar was "nailed" to the position 44.1 khz (removed) and nuisance was an active resampler (removed). Now everything works like clockwork. Once again thanks to everyone. Damir Link to comment
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