Audiophile grade analog to digital converter

dCS, Apogee and Prism all have sterling reputations as studio converters. But Benchmark, Mytek, RME, Grace, Lynx, Drawmer and others also make very high quality products. Much of what would make an A/D best for someone depends upon what features you seek. Since so many of the converters rely upon the same chipsets you might discover that A/D don't sound that different from one another. What are you looking to do?

24 bit instead of 16 bit will give you more digital headroom to play with. AKM make excellent chipsets used in many devices. Clocking is critical for any converter but this has been a well known concern for over 10 years....so most modern well built devices with good power supplies should perform well.

Personally. I'd go for device features first (inputs/ouputs/formats etc.) rather than buy a device based only on the ADC.

There is no best. That's like asking what is the best flavored ice cream?

You'll get many different opinions, my favorite is the dcS La Scala, at $15K it's a bit pricey though. I wouldn't say it is the best, simply the one that suits my tastes best. I can't say that I've heard them all either though.

The Lynx is a popular sound card. There is also the EMU-0404 style input box.

For LPs, I designed "The Ripper". Matches an audiophile phono section to a 16-bit ADC. Everything you need (except for a PC and turntable) to rip your own CDs.

jh

Everything dCS seams to be DSD, which won't work. I'm looking at these things and considering their use for vinyl transfer.

But I think I have to agree with Shadorne, and the CEDAR ADA is the best unit to use.

I've been researching similar systems for vinyl archiving and transfer. Two hard-disk recorder products come to mind: the Tascam DV-RA1000HD and the Alesis Masterlink ML-9600. The Tascam recorder will support up to 24-bit resolution at sampling rates as high as 192 kHz (DSD or PCM). The Masterlink can handle up to 24/96, but seems most suitable for Redbook CD. Both units seem like excellent value for the money; the Tascam has a street price of $2K and the Masterlink can be gotten for just under $800.

Dear Dnewhous : I'm using the Lynx sound card ( I have two of them ) that could works up to 24/192.

It is a very good performer about: hard to beat. The Lynx sound cards, in my humble opinion, were ( for some time ) the standard reference in the industry.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

Lynx = excellent. But there's a hitch. CEDAR now offers a set of software tools, which at $4000 (seams to be the price) are a bargain for CEDAR. If you're going to use digital noise filtering, use CEDAR or not at all.
The CEDAR tools only work with Pro Tools, and fortunately there is a low cost version, Prot Tools M-powered at $300, that works with M-Audio soundcards. M-Audio cards are too cheap themselves to be usable as anything other than an interface.
If it weren't for all that, Lynx would be the obvious choice.

Another thing that's good to know: DVD lab pro is reputable shareware that can produce audio only DVD-video, and it only cost $245. The only commercial software that can do that is Sonic Scenarist which costs $5000.