Is anyone familiar with the Ayre Dac??

I know I'm going off topic, but I had to comment on a post above that states the DX-5 is the flagship of Ayre's line, it is not, it is a Blueray player that sadly missed the mark when it came to an audio player. The C5 is still by far a better sounding machine.

Audio, I think you should try the REFLink with an AES Silversmith cable to the DAC3.5VB MKII.

I suspect that might beat the ST connection.

I do not think you can better the ST connection.

I experimented once with the Ayre QB-9 USB DAC. At first, I was impressed with the way it sounded. I used the MAC Book Pro computer with 4 GB RAM and the 120GB solid state drive. I used the Seaport Free Agent Go Pro 500GB external hard drive to store my music files.

After several months of listening, I decided I did not like it the way it sounded in my system. In addition, there were too many boxes and wires in my living room. I sold everything and returned to my Ayre CX-7e MP CD player. I never looked back and continue to like my Ayre CX-7e MP CD player very much.

For me, I liked the sound coming from the Ayre CX-7e MP CD Player better than the sound coming from the MAC computer and the Ayre QB-9 DAC. It felt more natural, clearer and better than the computer and DAC did. I like my Ayre CX-7eMP very much. It is running balanced into my Luxman L-590ax integrated amplifier. I hope this helps you better understand the Ayre QB-9. I suggest you borrow one and try it in your system.

Computer Audio doesn't stay static.

I would say that in 2010/2011, it was still better to spin a disc. These days, I am not so sure. Especially when you have something like Audirvana Plus in Direct/INT mode.