D to A converter purchase....

whiskeypirate
I’m debated on either a Wadia 321 or the Schiit Gungnir Multibit.

Wadia is delta sigma conversion and the Schiit is r2r multibit.

If Redbook pcm 24/96 or 16/44 or DXD cd or download is your priority, the go with the bit perfect way of converting it, which is r2r multibit. As delta sigma only gives you a facsimile of it.

Read this from MoJo Music:
" When a Redbook PCM file is played on a native DSD delta sigma single-bit converter, the single-bit DAC chip has to convert the PCM to DSD in real-time. This is one of the major reasons people claim DSD sounds better than PCM, when in fact, it is just that the chip in most modern single-bit delta sigma DACs do a poor job of decoding PCM."

Cheers George

I do not have experience with either the Wadia 321 or the Schiit Gungnir Multibit. However, I do have experience with a Schiit Yggdrasil and experience dealing with Schiit as a company (business entity). I'll give them a thumbs up.

No experience with Wadia but have heard the Gungnir Multibit. Note that the Gungnir Multibit is effectively an 18-bit DAC, so despite the ad copy about 'bit perfection' it won't decode those last few digits if you have hi-res files.

The Schiit house sound doesn't quite gel with my personal taste (in the case of the Gungnir, I feel it smoothes over too much low-level detail) but it may prove to be a worthy match in your system.

Note that the Gungnir Multibit is effectively an 18-bit DAC

Not according to Schiit

.........coupled to four precision Analog Devices AD5781BRUZ digital to analog converters for true hardware balancing and 19 effective bits of resolution.

The DAC chip is 18 bit, however, Schiit uses two per channel.

2^18 = 262144
2* (2^18) = 2* 262144
524288 = 524288
2^19 = 524288

Yes, I realize the gain in signal-to-noise ratio when you combine the converter chips that way, but it's still an 18-bit part and will only decode 18 bits worth of data.