What is the best DAC?
Here at Verdant Audio we spend A LOT of time evaluating different DACs. Dozens of different DACs have been evaluated, ranging from the Khadas Tone2(~$300) all the way up to dCS Rossini with Rossini Clock (~$42K). Some of these we carry, some we don’t, but we are forever on the search to find the best possible products at each price point to share with our customers.
Before you read this article looking for the answer, we do want to be upfront- we don’t think there is one way to definitively say one DAC is THE best in the market. Ultimately, we have never found something that is universally all things to all people. What we have learned in these tests is that the key to selecting a great DAC is system synergy. This takes into account your room, other equipment and of course, your personal taste in how a system sounds.
Not one size fits all.
When choosing a DAC, there are multiple factors you should consider in terms of sound, along with practical things like input and features that you want or need.
Tonality is part of it. Is the DAC bright or dark, forward or laid back? Some audio experts think that this has to do with whether the DAC is R2R (Resistor Ladder) or a Delta Sigma using off the shelf chips or Delta Sigma using FPGA chips. This is potentially the wrong way to think about DACs.
The type of converter does not ultimately dictate the sound profile. Each one of these DAC types can have a range to its sound, so you should never assume a particular type is going to have a particular sound profile. For example, there is a common misconception that DACs built around ESS Sabre Chips are bright and R2Rs are all warm. The Canor DAC 2.10 and Weiss Helios are good examples of DACs built around the ESS chips that are neutral to warm. The Rockna Wavedream is a great example of an R2R that is dead neutral in its sound profile.
Your taste in music can determine what is right for you.
The key with tonality is understanding how it sounds. This is why we have spent so much time listening rather than just looking at measurements and are in process of compiling a “sound map” the same way one would develop a flavor map for whisky. One axis is tonality, the other is imaging, our next factor.
Image needs to be thought of in terms of height, width and depth. Height and width usually work together. If an image is extremely wide extending well beyond the boundary of our speakers this is generally accompanied by excellent height if appropriate. It does not necessarily correspond with image depth though. Some brands will give you a gargantuan image in terms of size but the sound is presented in a relatively flat way. Others deliver an incredibly deep stage with instruments at varying depth but may lack scale with no significant image beyond the boundaries of the speakers. The question is, what do you like? We have listened and can help you choose.
It's all in the details.
The next factor in terms of sound is detail, clarity and focus or stability. Detail and clarity are about the DACs ability to deliver fine details from high resolution source files. This can be DSD downloaded or via SACD or high resolution FLAC files. A great example is the beginning of the song Kind of Blue from Miles Davis. The bass plucks in the beginning of that song have an extraordinary amount of detail. Highly resolving DACs can allow you to literally hear the sound of a finger dragging across the string on high res files. Less resolving DACs will still present a high res file with a bass note but will lack the fine details.
Depending on preference, this can be a good thing or a bad thing. Fine details can come across as fatiguing in certain scenarios and be deemed less musical. In practice, better resolution gives you these fine details but also eliminates the massing of strings and will give you good separation between instruments in terms of the image. And by this, we mean that drums will be coming from one location while a bass or piano will come from a different location.
The other aspect in terms of image is stability or focus in terms of where these things are coming from. Generally, the voice should be focused in the center of the image and be about where a person would be standing singing. Instruments should be spread out and locally focused. The best DACs will highlight fine differences in the location of percussion instruments. Others simply are a glom of the voices and instruments in one place.
The boring but necessary factors.
The final factors are the raw features of the DAC and what you need in your system. Do you need an on-board streamer or Roon End-Point? Do you need a volume control or analog inputs? How are you delivering a signal to your device and what input is best to connect? Do you need a full preamp stage? Many DACs offer a bunch of inputs but usually some are better than others. If you have a server that is optimized for USB output, it is best to pick a DAC that is optimized for USB input. If you don’t have a preamp, you might think getting a DAC with a volume control is all you need but often this does not lead to optimal component matching. This we will address in another BLOG post.
The key is choosing the right product for you among all these factors. This can seem daunting but this is very much why we have such a robust selection of DACs but also why we have spent so much time listening to them and evaluating them. A 30-45min consultation can help you narrow the field of options and zero in on the right product for you and your system. We are always happy to help our customers and can get you on the road to buying the best DAC for YOU.