Can I safely assume that the DAC in my 18 month old Atom is of significantly better quality than the DAC in my 20 year old Linn Genki CD player?
I asked a dealer and he was rather equivocal, and claimed that the Genki DAC was still a very good one.
If you’ve got both, shouldn’t you be answering that question rather than asking it?
Roger
It’s a somewhat academic question as in practice, with the Atom, everything goes through the DAC as even the analogue input is digitised via an ADC and then goes through the DAC. That the being the case, the best way to connect your Genki would likely be digitally via the s/pdif coaxial connection.
I suspect that’s true, but it’s a costless experiment to try both and listen to the difference. And it might be interesting.
I keep meaning to try that with my CD5XS into my Atom, but been too busy lately.
Roger
Fair point, but to date I have been unable to detect any meaningful or consistent difference between the analogue and the digital methods of connecting the Genki to the Atom, but I guess any actual differences might be being masked by the two interconnects that I have available. That’s why I sought other people’s opinions before spending time and money on testing different interconnects.
Ah, got it. I think the ADC in the Atom is closely tailored to the DAC so going through both should give little deterioration in the signal. That’s my understanding anyway, but happy to be corrected.
Roger
Thanks @Richard.Dane thats what I suspected. My failure (so far) to hear much difference might be because I’ve been using a fairly mundane digital coaxial cable (AudioQuest Forest) and (so I’ve been assured) a ‘high end’ analogue pair.
Regardless of how you’re connecting the Genki, it’s still being processed digitally in the Atom, hence lack of difference. Having said that though, the cassette deck, Rega P3 sound very distinct compared to the on-board streaming on my Atom.
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