Best qobuz records to compare dac upgrades


I would like to upgrade my dac, from a topping 70s to something matching the quality of the rest of the system, likely in the range below 4k. To minimize the impact of interplay between different audio components (ampli, dac, speakers, power,...) I intend to use my headphone ampli and headphones (Aurium and Senn 880, resp), sourced by Qobuz and Auralic Aries2, auditioning different dacs. Comparing different hardware requires recordings of sufficient quality to avoid sort of saturation in how good the final signal could become. Some music i love, and which I would naively use for the comparisons, might fail to enhance the different quality of different dacs, since the recording itself is not good enough to reveal important differences. E.g. I noticed that some releases offered in 24 bits are not particularly better than their standard, lower rate, editions. I wonder whether you have good suggestions for tracks that in your experience  are particularly valuable in such an exercise. I mostly listen to jazz, classical and opera, but I am very open to all good music, and anyway this is sort of a technical test, so any good suggestion is welcome!

128x128michelangelo

Showing 1 response by jim204

Hi there as you say you are interested in classical music may I give you a couple of suggestions. My first is a new recording of Mozart's Wind Music on Deutsche Gramophone by the Blaserphilharmonie. Very open and detailed and a superb spread of instruments which lets you hear the different segments of the ensemble with perfect clarity. The second recommendation is more general in that I would suggest nearly any recording in the BIS catalogue as their recordings are beautifully recorded by artists of the highest calibre and I think would be ideal for you.