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Affordable alternativ to the PS Audio DirectStream DAC

I have borrowed a DirectStream DAC from my dealer very nice of him because he knows that I can't afford it (:
I have to say it is everything I have ever wanted from a streamer/dac. Music just pouring out of my speakers, real sweet music.

Voices just sounds so real, everything is in place, there are details but not in your face. I just love it. This is like music should sound.

I am using it with a PrimaLuna HP integrated. Very nice combo.

The DirectStream DAC junior is discontinuing and I can't get my hands on a used one.

If you have heard the DirectStream DAC and know of another dac sounding as musical -- let me know   
martin-andersen

Showing 2 responses by rbstehno

rbstehno
1,401 posts
 
I used to own the Auralic Aries streamer which I thought was much better than the LUMIN and Aurender. I got rid of that and my external dac and the expensive usb cable ($750) and went with the ps audio DS dac with bridge board. Much much better. Use Roon on my Mac and use Ethernet to connect to the dac. The DS jr is almost as good as the sr version, gets the same updates. Fpga based dacs are the way to go. Every 6 months or so you get a free update that makes the dac better sounding or adding in additional features like MQA at no charge. People and reviewers like this dac years ago using the then current firmware, and now the latest snowmass firmware is much much better
rbstehno
1,401 posts
 
If you hear somebody complaining about the PSA DS dac, ask them what release of the firmware did they use. Most people like the improvement each release provides. I’ve updated the dac multiple times and each new release sounded better than the prior release.
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