POLL: PS Audio DAC owners, which company manufactured the primary source component feeding your DAC?

Audio Components DACs
1

POLL: PS Audio DAC owners, which company manufactured the primary source component feeding your DAC?

  • Apple computer
  • AURALiC
  • Aurender
  • Bluesound
  • Bryston
  • Esoteric
  • Innuos
  • Lumin
  • Melco
  • OPPO
  • PS Audio
  • Roon Nucleus(+)
  • Small Green Computer
  • Sonore
  • Sonos
  • Squeezebox (Slim Devices or Logitech)
  • Windows computer
  • Wyred4Sound
  • Other

0 voters

2

No dCS! What an omission - their network bridge is the best source Iā€™ve heard.

3

I suppose dCS would count as ā€˜Otherā€™ along with SoTM. Hard to remember all the options to be sure. :slight_smile:

4

Polls are limited to a maximum of 19 choices, so I could not list everything. No disrespect intended to dCS, SoTM, or any other unlisted brand.

5

I recently sold my PSA DAC, but still voted.

6

Sonore in the streaming chain but not the primary streamer so voted the SGC. Not sure of the intent of question my Sonore ultraRendu able to stream from memory card but most devices they sell are not considered primary streamers.

7

Sonore Signature Series Rendu here. Audio files (FLAC, DSF for example) are sent to it over the network via JRiver or Roon. It decodes and renders the files, then PCM or raw DSD is sent out via I2S to my Direcstream. Itā€™s the best sounding source component Iā€™ve personally heard for the Direcstream thus far. Careful consideration was taken for the power supply and I2S output board, which is why Iā€™m assuming it sounds as good as it does.

8

Be interesting to know what the Others are. Those who voted ā€œOtherā€ - if you feel like it, let us know that you did and what youā€™re using.

9

Other: 432 EVO Aeon music server

1 Like
10

Oh yeah - you still running it at 432, Jeff?

11

Yes sir! :slightly_smiling_face:

12

Yes, as ā€˜Othersā€™ is the 2nd most popular category in this survey!

My ā€˜Othersā€™ is dCS Network Bridge which is a great improvement in terms of SQ compared with both the Sonore Rendu (original ethernet>SPDIF renderer) and the PS Audio Bridge 2 I used previously.

13

I use the Briscasti M5. When I put in my system it immediately replaced the Aurrender N100H.

14

That requires a computer source though?

15

I play from a Dell XPS Windows 10 J River 25 via WW Cat 8 to the router and with WW Cat 8 to the Briscasti. This sounds better than playing the same files directly from my former Aurrender.

16

Pink Faun

1 Like
17

Modern playback chains can make answering the poll question kinda tricky. The list of devices which must all be functioning simultaneously in order to get music into my DAC is rather long. Working backwardsā€¦

iFi SPDIF iPurifier (converting Toslink to coax)
Squeezebox Touch (ethernet in, Toslink out)
Two ethernet switches
Roon hosted on a QNAP TVS-471 NAS

If Iā€™m streaming something from the Internet rather than playing local files then you can add:
Switch, router, modem, HFC infrastructure etc
Tidal cloud services

Some of you will have an opinion on the sound quality impact of each and every one of these elements. My worry-less strategy is to stay at or very close to bit-perfect transmission, keep the DS electrically isolated via Toslink (my only other input is also optical from the TV) and let Tedā€™s engineering take care of the rest.

18

Other. Intel NUC running roon rock. Not a roon nucleus but close.

19

I have the NUC8i7BEH in an AKASA fanless Case with Roon ROCK and I voted in that category. BTW a great product.

20

Mines a NUC7i5 in an akasa case. Runs really cool even at peak CPU usage.