Check out the MSB site's description of their new Platinum DAC where they take a stab at describing the differences. BTW this is an excellent unit. I replaced by Theta Pro Gen Va upraded to 96k with the MSB Platinum unit. I directly compared the Perpetual Technologies upsampler with both DACs and thought the result was inferior. I actually had the dCs units in my system on a borrowed basis earlier this year. In my opinion (but from my memory) while they gave better sound the Platinum covers more than half the distance from the Theta to the dCs. The Platinum's balanced outputs are able to drive my power amp directly from the DAC without an intermediate analog buffer stage. I think good comparison to heat the effects of the digital processing, if you have an excellent analog rig, is to compare the RCA Reiner recordings of Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra and Music for Strings Percussion and Celesta on the Classics Records vinyl to the most recent remaster on CD. These recordings are some of the most realistic recordings of a symphony orchestra ever made. The difference with upsampling jumps out. (The vinyl is still better but not so much that really bothers me)
Upsampling DACS: Take the Pepsi Challenge
HAs anyone used 2 of the following 3 relatively inexpensive upsampling DACs: Perpetual technologies, Bel Canto, MSB Link 3 with upsampling upgrade?? I am trying to sort out the details of the new technologies. The Perp Tech can "interpolate", while the others do not. I am under the impression that the "24 bit" part of this new technology has to do with s/n ratios aroung 140 db, which is great, but a little useless considering the other equipment in the system. The sampling freq is the part that has me all aflutter, because it seems to be getting closer to analog quality "infinite sampling" if you will... What do you think? Has anyone compared these dacs?? Thanks, gang.