Maybe it IS all in the DAC chips
I’ve often pushed back against the idea of purchasing any piece of audio gear based on the parts contained, especially DAC’s. While the Digital to Analog Converter (DAC) itself is the key component, so much goes into making a good sounding product, like stream buffers/jittter removal, power supplies and analog output stage that I thought this could lead buyers astray.
Still, having done that, and still thinking that I correctly warned others to avoid buying just on DAC brands alone, I have found myself after many years, returning again to vintage Burr Brown based DACs and home theater processors.
Color me changed with experience.
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@mahler123 , we’ll if it isn’t broken 😆. I have a handful of rock concerts on Blu-ray and I read the the Oppo limits the resolution due to licensing. Apparently the Dbob defeats the resolution restriction allowing full resolution to be sent in the digital domain to your DAC. Unfortunately I have a Yiggy and they don’t play together, so I never investigated further. I like Bryston gear as my buddy had a full suite before moving on to Mac. I live off his hand me downs. Regards , Mike B. |
Sony has had the patents for DSD locked up since it's inception and the vast majority of the DAC chips available for the last couple of decades have incorporated PCM up to 192 Khz as well as DSD capability all the way up to 512 when it became available. The issue requires licensing the use of the format available incorporated in the chip and implementing it in a manner the licensing allows.
Probably just the particular chip's data sheet you looked at because TI would not let it's pants down and not be competitive in that market segment.
SACD is a multi-format medium from single layer SACDs that will only work in players capable of decoding them along with Super Audio CD that contain multiple formats on a single disc and are designed to be backward compatible with all CD players and not requiring any "down conversion" whatsoever. Just look at the labeling on your SACD's packaging. |
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