Looking for a DAC to pair w/ Jay's transport mk2

@hbarrel, yeah I don’t care about DSD cd’s (SACD) either. I’m just a used cd crate digger and could care less about an uber priced cd. I’ve got thousands of cd’s boxed up as I’ve been a phono head for some years now and like so many of us did some years ago sold our cd’s or albums, I did not, I held on to them.

I’m really curious to see the Laiv streamer when it comes out too. 

Here’s correspondence I got from Soon from Laiv about the Laiv pinout mode intelligent auto-configuration and passed the specs on to Brad:

Dear Tyray,

Good Day!

You can use Laiv mode for the I2S connection with the Shanling ET3. We have many customers using the Shanling ET3 with our Harmony DAC via I2S and getting great results.
 

@tyray i think you need to convert the .png to a jpeg. 
I could not let myself spend a large sum of money on a data transfer cable. 
$20 for 1m of blue jean best hdmi. 
Don’t like it I am out $20 not hundreds. 
the data transfer rate between a usb and a hdmi are the same. 
 

@hbarrel, Hey - to each his own. You count your blessing that you haven’t succumbed to that dreaded audio disease of up-grade-itis.  On my end, I can read my previous post just fine.

Also, my hifi rig is not computer based, but more old school and I’ve sold my Eversolo DMP-A8.

I see you have the LTA Aero DAC, I’m really enjoying my LTA Microzotl 3 preamp and am curious if you’ve upgraded your stock tubes of your LTA Aero DAC?   

If you could stretch a bit here’s a Lampi Big7 that’d likely do what you’re looking for.  Best of luck. 

https://www.usaudiomart.com/details/650201052-lampizator-big-7-gen4-dac/

Sorry to take so long to respond to your question, Tyray--just haven't checked in here for a while. In fact, I had no trouble at all with the I2s HDMI connection between the Pontus and the ET3. Just plugged it in with a Pangea Audio HDMI cable I happened to have on hand, and everything worked seamlessly.