Best DAC for $500

For me a Cambridge Audio DacMagic along with the Pangea P100 power supply is a great sounding combo. You can easily find the DacMagic for under $500 new and even less used.

I agree with Gumbydammit. The Emotiva is an excellent dac with 6 digital inputs. Buy that for 249.00 and add a Musical Fidelity V-Link for around 90 from Amazon and you will have one heck of a digital set up. You will be able to decode all files on your computer up to 96K and the spdif inputs will do 192khz. It took a 999.00 Wyred4Sound DAC1 to better the Emotiva. I am not kidding.

Bob

Ditto the DACmagic/Pangea 100 combo...more inputs and outputs than most, and it sounds truly amazing (not recommended for USB but I don't use that feature anyway. If I did I'd maybe get the new "plus" version) shop around (although the P100 power supply is cheap new) for used stuff, and keep in mind how insane the digital world is now, and how at under 500 clams you can get some well massaged digits flowing around. DACs seem to be the "best bang for the buck" zone in hifi, and imagine what's going to be available in 3 or 4 more years.

Beresford TC-7520 Caimen,which is why they have none to sell here at moment.

I just picked up a Schiit Audio Bigfrost DAC. It was $449. +S/H with the USB option. I am VERY happy with it. If you don't want the USB feature it's only $349. and you can add the option later as they use a modular system.