The main drawback--and reason why transport/dac combos fell out of favor for a few years--is that reflection back of the digital signal through the digital interconnect between the transport and the DAC introduces additional jitter into the system which would not be present in a one-box solution.
This problem has largely been eliminated in modern DACs, which use either low-jitter input receivers (like Musical Fidelity X-DACv3 and Channel Islands Audio VDA-1) or digital buffers (the Benchmark DAC).
The Musical Fidelity Tri-Vista should be relatively immune from jitter introduced through the interconnect. So, if your transport has sufficiently low jitter (anything under 200 ps peak jitter is GREAT), you will get excellent sound, and a one box player will have no real benefit at least as far as sound quality is concerned.
A DAC is really useful if you want to have a one-box solution for DVD and CD. Buy a cheapo DVD player with respectable jitter specs and a dedicated CD laser (such as the Phillips SACD players), couple it with your Tri-Vista, and you will have a world-class red book front end.
This problem has largely been eliminated in modern DACs, which use either low-jitter input receivers (like Musical Fidelity X-DACv3 and Channel Islands Audio VDA-1) or digital buffers (the Benchmark DAC).
The Musical Fidelity Tri-Vista should be relatively immune from jitter introduced through the interconnect. So, if your transport has sufficiently low jitter (anything under 200 ps peak jitter is GREAT), you will get excellent sound, and a one box player will have no real benefit at least as far as sound quality is concerned.
A DAC is really useful if you want to have a one-box solution for DVD and CD. Buy a cheapo DVD player with respectable jitter specs and a dedicated CD laser (such as the Phillips SACD players), couple it with your Tri-Vista, and you will have a world-class red book front end.