Alternatives to Arcam rDAC, MF 1-DAC and Rega DAC ???

Hi,

Often see Audiolab ex dem on ebay, usually go for between £425-£475, within your budget and with good choice of inputs.

DacMagic + i believe retails for about £350 and again good range of inputs.

Both on my radar at present.

Good luck, intrigued how you get on.

This gets rave reviews and it is very good indeed; heard it side by side with the Rega DAC and the MF M1DAC and preferred the Emotiva by a long shot; an overall smoother but more detailed sound

http://www.itemaudio.co.uk/emotiva_xda1.html

I have one of these and rate it highly.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PS-Audio-Digital-Link-III-Audio-DAC-/230882581...

There's 2 s/h available. I have nothing to do with either.

crikey 2 **** DACs failing?

you must be extremely unlucky? What was the problem?

Audiolab M-DAC. Better than the three DACs you listed and one of few DACs with more than one optical input. Plus remote control and headphone amp (if you ever interested in it)

Better? have you listened to all the other DACS can you quantify better?

Yes, I did. M1 and Rega were at my home demo at the same time, M-DAC sounded better. They sounded better thru SPDIF coax inputs and I also found that M-DAC's USB input implementation was better as well. I owned RDAC before.

I guess it all comes down to how you like the presentation! They are all good DACS.

I have only ever heard the Rega DAC, but when I heard it with my Brio/RS1 it just made my toes curl, it made a big upgrade to my cdp maybe it was the Rega synergy kicking in, but I have never regret buying it.

I think probably the M_DAC sounded better in 'your' system but I wouldnt say any of the mentioned DACS are better than each other...only my opinion though!

Rega DAC has 2 coax, 2 optical & 1 USB

Thank you all for your comments. I will search out this thread in future if I need to revisit the subject.  For now I have been talked into trying number three of the same; at least it saves me having to decide.

Steve, I don't know why you assumed two Rega failures; I was careful to not name and shame because I do believe I have just been extremely unlucky.  Support from the company in question has been good.  To answer your question about what was wrong, the first suffered frequent short dropouts in a wired streaming system and the second started cutting out completely within two minutes of starting to receive a signal and had to be rebooted to get another 90 seconds, etc, etc.

errr because you said so in your post, I must say Rega are very good at sorting these things out - I would go as far as saying you have been extremely very unlucky! 

Out of interest re: the hard wired connection were you using optical or coax? did you try another cable?

Ah! I can see why you thought that.  The reference to the Rega DAC was only intended to fix my price limit.  Sorry for the confusion.

ifor I see

i have changed my initial post so google doesnt pick it up that **** DAC faliure!

I must say the Rega DAC is superb imho

Steve, I just noticed I haven't answered your question.  Optical connection.  I tried three different cables.  The company replicated the same problem in their lab when I returned the first unit.  It only happened with one audio source both in at my place and in the lab.  The other units they tested all performed perfectly so we were confident the replacement unit would be absolutely fine, which it appeared to be for a couple of weeks or so.  I wasn't paying too much attention to it because at the same time I had a Graham Slee phono stage (excellent by the way) on home loan.  When the phono stage went back I turned my attention back to the DAC and became aware that it had failed in very different way to the first.