Looking for the best AMP + DAC for Focal Elex within $500

It’s somewhat rare tbh, you have to look online and see if the album was ever released on SACD, and if not it wasn’t ever in DSD. You just have to look around

The SRV SACD remasters we’re stellar, but I think they are the same as the 192/24 masters amazon has.
I really wouldn’t worry about DSD, it would have been nice had it taken off, but it didn’t, so it can be ignored.

Yeah you can safely live your life without worrying about dsd lol. Its really only for the diehard fans of sacd or if all the other masters out there are bad and there happens to be a sacd that sounds amazing for some reason

So here’s a potential question – is raw vinyl, assuming the vinyl is mint and the equipment is great and proper, considered better quality than digital? And if so, is it possible to encode to DSD yourself?

We just have a massive record collection here at the house. Dad has stuff like the first edition of the Beatles white album, we could probably make our own DSDs if we wanted.

Problem is probably wear though, he’s listened to most of the music worth listening to hundreds if not thousands of times, so probably wouldn’t be better than whatever’s already out there I suppose.

So I won’t comment if it’s considered better, the answer is yes or no, it depends. Regarding dsd, you can get ADCs that record in DSD but the cheap ones are pretty meh sounding and the good ones are extremely expensive. I would just use a good olde pcm ADC as I think you could get better quality out of one for the price

In that case may as well just get a player and do it directly, lol. I was just going to record for archival purposes.

In this case, what about simply playing back in DSD without the recording features? Like a turntable that would stream DSD live to my DAC.

Overthinking things I’m sure, but just asking things I figure are worth asking so I understand what’s out there.

Wait that’s dumb I just realized, oof. What am I thinking. No need to digitize at all in that case just connect it to the damned AMP directly, lmao.

Vinyl is just vinyl. It sounds different I personally would have no interest in transferring it to any digital format.

There is no real advantage in encoding anything as DSD anymore, it’s about the same as 96/24 PCM from an information theoretical standpoint, the big wins were really on the mastering side, it was easier to make high quality DSD ADC’s. And DAC’s for DSD are incredibly simple to make at a high quality level.

I was a big SACD fan, but 96/24 and up recordings sound just as good to me.
You can just forget DSD existed at this point, unless you are really enamored by a particular recording in the format.

Lol, as long as you have a phono preamp you can just connect your amp directly

But you have to consider what a really GOOD turntable/arm/cartridge/preamp costs.
If you really wanted to do it properly, you’d spend more on the cartridge than most people spend on their entire digital stack.

Dad has an old Pioneer turntable from the 70’s or 80’s that runs on some $600+ cartidge. The issue is no preamp (it connects to his also-vintage kenwood speaker setup) so maybe I need to find a good preamp.

I just started… and I’m already $1000 deep into what I’ve spent on my turntable, including the phono stage… lol

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Of course lol, I didn’t discuss that because I didn’t want to get into the which is better argument which we are now transitioning into lol

Yeah discussions made by me can really run off on tangents.

Just thought maybe the RNHP + Clear might sound really good listening to our Vinyl collection too.

Wait until you hear a really good system, suddenly that $1500+ cartridge seems like a deal and you start to see how deep the pit really goes.
I might spend $1500 on a CD transport for my stereo, I’d set aside closer to $5000 as a starting point if I ever decided vinyl was something I wanted to get back into.

Not to say you can’t have a good sounding system for much less than that.

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I’ve done vinyl rips on a friends insane turntable setup, was pretty nice

Just buy a phono preamp and listen directly, you’ll lose a huge amount digitizing it, with anything affordable.

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Yeah dad’s a real “ANALOGUE!!!” buff. He’ll never go digital, but I figured he’d enjoy at least hearing his music on a good modern AMP+Headphone.

Lol well yeah a good headphone and amp should be analog enough for him

We’ve literally had dozens of arguments about the pros/cons of analogue vs digital dozens upon dozens of times. My main argument is that analogue may sound better the first play but since it physically wears it’s basically never the same, plus you’re subject to potential imperfections in the manufacturing process etc and only the masters that the copies are made from is truly the real deal.

We also get into arguments about computer brains vs human brains, etc etc etc.

But he swears by it, I think he grew-up with it and enjoys it’s warmth, imperfections, hissing, and popping from wear be damned. And I figure that’s pretty respectable.