Requirement of a DAC

[kamal1675]

Hi guys... Could anyone pl explain to me the requirement of DAC... Read abt it on net but not very clear... understood that it converts digital to analog as the name suggests... I have marantz PM 6005 amp and BA A26 bookshelves... I play music frm laptop or mobile through Logitech bluetooth adapter... For headphone also I directly connect it to phone or laptop...Now where does DAC figure in all this... If I m able to play it as such then what is the requirement of a seperate DAC... Pl pardon my ignorance... Can anyone explain me it's use

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[drkrack]

DAC will convert your Digital Signal to Analog , You will need a DAC if you want to improve the audio resolution that is sound quality.
With a collection of ACDs, Flac etc you will be benefitted a lot by adding a Dedicated DAC to your system. The digital to Analog conversion is one of the critical steps in playing digital media, the final audio resolution depends upon this step if all other variable parameters like Room acoustics, Speaker positioning (these two things are equally important) etc are taken care. This is where a Good DAC improves a sound quality.

in your system Dedicated DAC will be included like this.
BDP 180 -> Toslink/Optical Cable-> DAC-> PM 6005 (analog in)->BA26

Before buying a DAC experiment with these possibilities too..
Both your 1. BDP 180 (Analog Out to PM 6005,where DAC of BDP180 is used) and
2. PM 6005 (Toslink or Optical connection from BDP 180 to PM6005, where DAC of PM6005 will be used) have a decent inbuilt DAC , check these two options and see if it satisfies your needs. You'll have to go for a at least a Modi 2 Uber Multibit (Headphonezone.com ~22k INR) to get a remarkable upgrade over your existing setup.
As with everything in HiFi ; DACs range from 500Rs to 5Lakh and more so chose your option(poison) after a good research.
Your Logitech BT adapter is converting the BT signal to Analog (that is another cheap DAC you have) which cannot be overridden as there is no digital out in Logitech BT adapter.
Hope this helps

 

[rajivaryan1984]

Dear Friends,
I have been regularly reading your posts and really got to know lot of things about DAC. I really need help from you guys as you guys are real experts and one thing for sure that your guidance will not go wrong. Therefore, please suggest me the right option.
My current set up is Samsung 55 Inches 3d Smart TV, Denon AVR X2200 with Dali Zensor 5 Floor standing, Dali Zensor Vocal as centre, SVS as subwoofer and Dali Zensor 1 as Surround and Pioneer BDP 180 as my Blu-ray Player. When it comes to movies I am pretty much satisfied from my 5.1 effect. But when it comes on playing music from Pioneer BDP-180 like I have who lot of collection of original Audio CDs / Flac & Wav files I was not getting that crystal crisp clear music and that clarity feeling is always missing. All these while after reading a lot of forums and Blogs I got to know that Pioneer BDP 180 has got a very good DAC and should work properly as it has to be connected to the AVR via ARC Analog cable as currently in my setup the connection is via HDMI Cable which might be one of the issue. Though I have ordered for a branded quality cable from Amazon yesterday and will wait to use the same to check if there are any changes in the music quality but I need your expert advice and guidance :--
1. Do I need to use any of the DACs like Arcam iDAC / Modi 2 Uber / Modi Multibit or any other DACs? Please recommend
2. Kindly Suggest how the DAC will be installed and configured from the BDP-180 to Denon AVR and what all configuration or settings has to be done on AVR.
Request for your valuable suggestions ??

 

[rajivaryan1984]

is this the one you are referring to - https://www.headphonezone.in/collections/schiit/products/schiit-modi-multibit

 

[rajivaryan1984]

Also do we need 2 of them as when I am ordering it 2 qty is getting selected

 

[drkrack]

DAC will convert your Digital Signal to Analog , You will need a DAC if you want to improve the audio resolution that is sound quality.
With a collection of ACDs, Flac etc you will be benefitted a lot by adding a Dedicated DAC to your system. The digital to Analog conversion is one of the critical steps in playing digital media, the final audio resolution depends upon this step if all other variable parameters like Room acoustics, Speaker positioning (these two things are equally important) etc are taken care. This is where a Good DAC improves a sound quality.

in your system Dedicated DAC will be included like this.
BDP 180 -> Toslink/Optical Cable-> DAC-> PM 6005 (analog in)->BA26

Before buying a DAC experiment with these possibilities too..
Both your 1. BDP 180 (Analog Out to PM 6005,where DAC of BDP180 is used) and
2. PM 6005 (Toslink or Optical connection from BDP 180 to PM6005, where DAC of PM6005 will be used) have a decent inbuilt DAC , check these two options and see if it satisfies your needs. You'll have to go for a at least a Modi 2 Uber Multibit (Headphonezone.com ~22k INR) to get a remarkable upgrade over your existing setup.
As with everything in HiFi ; DACs range from 500Rs to 5Lakh and more so chose your option(poison) after a good research.
Your Logitech BT adapter is converting the BT signal to Analog (that is another cheap DAC you have) which cannot be overridden as there is no digital out in Logitech BT adapter.
Hope this helps

This answers most of your questions about requirements of a DAC.

Dear Friends,
I have been regularly reading your posts and really got to know lot of things about DAC. I really need help from you guys as you guys are real experts and one thing for sure that your guidance will not go wrong. Therefore, please suggest me the right option.
My current set up is Samsung 55 Inches 3d Smart TV, Denon AVR X2200 with Dali Zensor 5 Floor standing, Dali Zensor Vocal as centre, SVS as subwoofer and Dali Zensor 1 as Surround and Pioneer BDP 180 as my Blu-ray Player. When it comes to movies I am pretty much satisfied from my 5.1 effect. But when it comes on playing music from Pioneer BDP-180 like I have who lot of collection of original Audio CDs / Flac & Wav files I was not getting that crystal crisp clear music and that clarity feeling is always missing. All these while after reading a lot of forums and Blogs I got to know that Pioneer BDP 180 has got a very good DAC and should work properly as it has to be connected to the AVR via ARC Analog cable as currently in my setup the connection is via HDMI Cable which might be one of the issue. Though I have ordered for a branded quality cable from Amazon yesterday and will wait to use the same to check if there are any changes in the music quality but I need your expert advice and guidance :--
1.Do I need to use any of the DACs like Arcam iDAC / Modi 2 Uber / Modi Multibit or any other DACs? Please recommend
2.Kindly Suggest how the DAC will be installed and configured from the BDP-180 to Denon AVR and what all configuration or settings has to be done on AVR.
Request for your valuable suggestions ??

You already have a very good setup, fact that 5.1 movie experience is satisfying but its not good for stereo listening, indicates room is playing a major role in ultimate experience. I had a similar problem with x2200w & basic room acoustics treatment made a appreciable difference.

Read my thread on room acoustic treatment issues at my place.
Consider this sequence ; optimizing speakers positioning - >Room acoustic treatment - >DAC upgrades - >Cables etc - >change to high end electronic and drivers in this order if you are not happy with the sound quality inspite of having reasonably good setup.

Hopefully this helps

is this the one you are referring to - https://www.headphonezone.in/collections/schiit/products/schiit-modi-multibit

You'll be definitely benefited by adding a dedicated DAC to your system, research a lot before taking a plunge, you need only one DAC not two.

 

[grunthos]

Dear Friends,
My current set up is Samsung 55 Inches 3d Smart TV, Denon AVR X2200 with Dali Zensor 5 Floor standing, Dali Zensor Vocal as centre, SVS as subwoofer and Dali Zensor 1 as Surround and Pioneer BDP 180 as my Blu-ray Player. When it comes to movies I am pretty much satisfied from my 5.1 effect. But when it comes on playing music from Pioneer BDP-180 like I have who lot of collection of original Audio CDs / Flac & Wav files I was not getting that crystal crisp clear music and that clarity feeling is always missing. All these while after reading a lot of forums and Blogs I got to know that Pioneer BDP 180 has got a very good DAC and should work properly as it has to be connected to the AVR via ARC Analog cable as currently in my setup the connection is via HDMI Cable which might be one of the issue.

I have a similar setup - Dali Zensor + Denon AVR

I have a few theories about less than perfect music playback
1) WASAPI
When playing WAV and FLAC on your computer, use a player with a WASAPI output (Foobar/JRiver). This plugin sounds much better than the default used on Windows

2) Dali Zensors have a very creamy smooth sound signature and the Denon is neutral. If you had used Yamaha instead of Denon, you would have gotten a little brighter sound (which sounds crisper)
(or if you had bought some other bright speaker like Klipsch instead of Dalis)
Unfortunately there is no way to prove this theory unless you go to a showroom and listen to Dali and Yamahas together

3) The source files
A lot of audio files sourced from the internet can be less than honest copies.
And lot of Indian music especially tends to be less than perfectly recorded, hence even original CDs sometimes lack that sparkle which a good source should have
Just an example (not sure if you have listened to Lucky Ali) - There was a compilation released called Get Lucky (in 2009 I think)
Listen to that vs his original albums
The songs in Get Lucky have been remastered and sound amazing, compared to originals. So the recording matters a lot

In your current setup (HDMI), you are using the DAC on your Denon
Personally, I think the DAC on your Denon AVR would be pretty okay, and the Pioneer BDP is unlikely to be miles better - so unlikely you are going to gain much from using DAC on Pioneer

 

[subhobh]

In a nutshell, DAC is there in all of your music source devices, such as Phone, Laptop. Its nothing but an electronic circuitry to convers Digital data to analog signal.

The only reason where you need a good quality separate DAC is to get a better quality source to take out more juice out of your music files. But you need to pay the a good amount (equal to your amplifier) to listen to the difference.

 

[kamal1675]

DAC will convert your Digital Signal to Analog , You will need a DAC if you want to improve the audio resolution that is sound quality.
With a collection of ACDs, Flac etc you will be benefitted a lot by adding a Dedicated DAC to your system. The digital to Analog conversion is one of the critical steps in playing digital media, the final audio resolution depends upon this step if all other variable parameters like Room acoustics, Speaker positioning (these two things are equally important) etc are taken care. This is where a Good DAC improves a sound quality.

in your system Dedicated DAC will be included like this.
BDP 180 -> Toslink/Optical Cable-> DAC-> PM 6005 (analog in)->BA26

Before buying a DAC experiment with these possibilities too..
Both your 1. BDP 180 (Analog Out to PM 6005,where DAC of BDP180 is used) and
2. PM 6005 (Toslink or Optical connection from BDP 180 to PM6005, where DAC of PM6005 will be used) have a decent inbuilt DAC , check these two options and see if it satisfies your needs. You'll have to go for a at least a Modi 2 Uber Multibit (Headphonezone.com ~22k INR) to get a remarkable upgrade over your existing setup.
As with everything in HiFi ; DACs range from 500Rs to 5Lakh and more so chose your option(poison) after a good research.
Your Logitech BT adapter is converting the BT signal to Analog (that is another cheap DAC you have) which cannot be overridden as there is no digital out in Logitech BT adapter.
Hope this helps

thanks for ur simple & valuable explaintion

 

[kamal1675]

In a nutshell, DAC is there in all of your music source devices, such as Phone, Laptop. Its nothing but an electronic circuitry to convers Digital data to analog signal.

The only reason where you need a good quality separate DAC is to get a better quality source to take out more juice out of your music files. But you need to pay the a good amount (equal to your amplifier) to listen to the difference.

Thanks

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