DAC help.....

Thanks for the information everyone. I think I’m going to try the AudioQuest cobalt for now. The only reason why I want mqa capability is because of tidal. Is mqa overrated? I ripped a lot of my music on to iTunes so I’m going to have to go back and rerip them so they aren’t compressed files. I may just get a good CD player if anyone can help recommend one? Also what’s the best connection to use if I get a stand-alone dac or CD player to the preamp? So far everything is going to be unbalanced rca. I’m sorry I’m all over the place. The problem is all the reading from forum to forum is quite confusing. I’m reading that ESLs suck and Roger sanders stuff isn’t that great so I’m a mess. Sorry for being a pain.
 
I personally don't care about MQA.

As for CD players, I like the Bryston BCD-3 and it is pretty popular and very well reviewed.

Unbalanced RCA is fine unless you have a somewhat noisy environment, in terms of electromagnetic interference. I have to run balanced XLR everywhere because of all the equipment here, but I'd say 99% of the setups people have don't need to run balanced XLR. The only other consideration is if your electronics prefer a balanced connection for whatever reason—sometimes the audio quality of a specific piece of equipment is better using one connection versus another.
 
I bought a month ago an Audioquest Cobalt too. The reason I took this is the same as yours: MQA. And what it does is reducing time smearing. After listening, I was quite pleased and the sound was much better then on my yamaha network player, even not with MQA. The latter I sold second hand for a big loss of money. But it is worth it, the Cobalt is a great DAC.

I was struggling with this, how to use this device? On what device is best to stream? Found a few solutions

- I have it on my Iphone connected via an Apple USB lightning to cam adapter, disadvantage, the power supply of batteries by phones tablets and laptops is not great
- use a pc and need to connect it to a USB 2 output. Disadvantage of that, the USB cable may not be too long and if you put the pc too close it disturbes the hifi set itself
- this is a very great streamer to put this DAC on, the SOTM-200 ultra neo a great choice for this
- this is a solution that is almost as good as previous, with a very great sound for 1/6 th of the price of the SOTM
, the Allo USBridge network bridge. It is a bang for buck solution, however you need a bit more work to install the right software in a linux based menu

I am not certain which one to choose, but it will be either the Allo, or the SOTM-200 ultra (neo)
 
I’m using a meridian 200 zone controller. Mqa capability list $1000. No aluminum faceplate, I needed a Mac tablet to integrate it, but that may just be my system. When I compare red book to mqa most of the time the difference is audible, not huge and during the day ambient noise can be greater. Worth a look for the money
 
The AQ Cobalt will be the weak link in your system. I would rather have DAC that does not do MQA and is of much higher quality and price than the AQ. The improvement in sound with a much higher end DAC will be much better than a cheap AQ DAC that does MQA. You are holding your system back for sure. Trust the opinions of the people on this forum who are way more knowledgeable than me. However, about 3 years ago I did a shootout with multiple DAC's at various price ranges and the cheaper ones sounded terrible when compared to higher end dac's. Several audiophile friends were in attendance.
 
Mechnutt said:
The AQ Cobalt will be the weak link in your system. I would rather have DAC that does not do MQA and is of much higher quality and price than the AQ. The improvement in sound with a much higher end DAC will be much better than a cheap AQ DAC that does MQA. You are holding your system back for sure. Trust the opinions of the people on this forum who are way more knowledgeable than me. However, about 3 years ago I did a shootout with multiple DAC's at various price ranges and the cheaper ones sounded terrible when compared to higher end dac's. Several audiophile friends were in attendance.
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what are most of your audio sources played via your DAC? Also a lot of my music is very compressed atm so that will hurt my playback ability correct? Would CD player be the best ?
 
School said:
what are most of your audio sources played via your DAC? Also a lot of my music is very compressed atm so that will hurt my playback ability correct? Would CD player be the best ?
Click to expand...


I ripped all my CD's to a hard drive and most new music is bought at high rez if available. I have a dedicated high end audio desk top that I built with 10gb of storage ( I have almost 8gb of music) and I remote in with a laptop using windows remote desktop. It is all sent to my Luxman DAC. I use Audirvana and Bug Head as my music players and can upsample my music. I use JRiver to rip music but I will also use it to upsample some music files to store on my hard drives. I plan on eventually getting Roon.

Larry
 
Mechnutt said:
I ripped all my CD's to a hard drive and most new music is bought at high rez if available. I have a dedicated high end audio desk top that I built with 10gb of storage ( I have almost 8gb of music) and I remote in with a laptop using windows remote desktop. It is all sent to my Luxman DAC. I use Audirvana and Bug Head as my music players and can upsample my music. I use JRiver to rip music but I will also use it to upsample some music files to store on my hard drives. I plan on eventually getting Roon.

Larry
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I am in agreement with Larry on this. I rip all my disks and have purchased a lot of high resolution download albums. I use a dedicated computer that I configured specifically for music. I run Roon and HQPlayer software on this machine. I use high grade USB cables (AudioQuest Coffees) out of the computer to a USB reclocker and then to my DAC. This allows me to send all of my music to the DAC in DSD512. I am not into streaming (tidal, etc.) but if I were it would also go through Roon and then HQPlayer and be upsampled to DSD512. This is a completely different, much much higher level then what MQA, at its very best, can do. To do this I obviously need a DAC that can handle DSD512 (ala the T+A).

As Mike has mentioned, this takes a fairly powerful computer to run Roon and HQPlayer. Certainly not a mac.
 
Mechnutt said:
The AQ Cobalt will be the weak link in your system. I would rather have DAC that does not do MQA and is of much higher quality and price than the AQ. The improvement in sound with a much higher end DAC will be much better than a cheap AQ DAC that does MQA. You are holding your system back for sure. Trust the opinions of the people on this forum who are way more knowledgeable than me. However, about 3 years ago I did a shootout with multiple DAC's at various price ranges and the cheaper ones sounded terrible when compared to higher end dac's. Several audiophile friends were in attendance.
Click to expand...

Agree with that, there are better DACS then this AQ Cobalt, and this will definitely not my final DAC.
;)
 
School said:
How is this as an option. https://www.bluesound.com/products/vault/

also for all you you using DACs what are youR audio sources?

i think I’m confused with how all this works
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My audio source is an IPad, when the battery is empty my old Galaxy tab, and last my Iphone, :blush:
No serious, my source sucks wanted to spend on this, and suddenly I got a now or never deal for an amp and that will cost all my savings.
Waiting for the test on this amp and will write about this impressive thing when it will be officially launched.

That Bluesound I am confused about it. I only see USB input, not output. Does this work with a AQ Cobalt?
 
School said:
how is the dac in this

https://nadelectronics.com/product/m12-digital-preamp-dac/
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I'm currently using the M12 preamp with a Bryston 4BSST amp. To my ears the NAD is a very open sounding piece. It's a 32 bit all digital preamp. I like how upgradable NAD products are by owners. Just buy a addon card plug it in. Download a driver on a flash drive. Install the driver and you just upgraded to a more capable piece of equipment. I've enjoyed the sound and how versatile this piece is. I added the 4k video card in it. But, never have used it.
 
Before the NAD M12 stereo preamp I was using a Marantz Processor for my home theater 7.1 system. I decided to go back to just a stereo system. I was looking into a integrated amp system. I auditioned the Music Hall, Anthem and a NAD integrated amps. I liked all three. But, ended up going to separate amp and preamp. I liked the sound and flexibility of the NAD. Anthem also has a really good sounding digital preamp. After two years I'm moving on to a integrated amp that I think will be with me for many many years.
 
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