wardl, understand that my preference includes the SGM music server, i’ve not listened to the Aqua Formula without it. but; with the SGM for my particular system i prefer the Aqua Formula to my much loved fully updated (actually new) Lampizator Golden Gate. where the DHT GG brings wonderful rich and colorful highlighting to vocals and lots of music, it does not do space or texture like the Formula. it is not as low in noise. in my system i prefer the presentation of the Formula. it is more ’of a piece’ with my vinyl and my system’s full range solidity. and the Formula is very natural and has wonderful tone and body.
likely there are many systems and listeners which would prefer my Lampizator Golden Gate to the Formula. it's a system and taste matching question.
my guess is that the Formula with the SGM server would be equal to the MSB DAC V Diamond, but maybe not the Select II. and the reason is the SMG’s optimization of HQ Player which will allow the RTR pcm dac of the Formula to still do dsd at a very high level.
I owned the Trinity dac which I view as better than the MSB V. and I think the SGM + Formula is equal to the Trinity dac in my system.
I hope that helps.