We own close to 2,000 CD's which we haven't been listening to for years--mainly because we were falling back into vinyl and it was a pain to get a flashlight to search the bookcases for specific CD's. My wake up call that DAC's had come a long way was after purchasing a Bluesound Vault 2i, mainly to archive all of the CD's. I have about 1300 ripped so far (as native resolution flacs). I set up an Intel NUC running the Roon Rock OS and the Vault connected to my Audio Research preamp with Transparent Audio interconnects. After being blown away by listening to just a few of the flac files I realized that the 6-year old DAC just didn't have the mojo the new ones do. Now digital and vinyl are enjoyed at about 50-50 rate. It's like getting all new CD's.
High resolution digital is dead. The best DAC's killed it.
Something that came as a surprise to me is how good DAC's have gotten over the past 5-10 years.
Before then, there was a consistent, marked improvement going from Redbook (44.1/16) to 96/24 or higher.
The modern DAC, the best of them, no longer do this. The Redbook playback is so good high resolution is almost not needed. Anyone else notice this?
Before then, there was a consistent, marked improvement going from Redbook (44.1/16) to 96/24 or higher.
The modern DAC, the best of them, no longer do this. The Redbook playback is so good high resolution is almost not needed. Anyone else notice this?