SN3 - DAC choices?

And that will just come down to personal preference

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How come you’ve changed DACs so often, 4 Qutests? Is it dissatisfaction with SQ, or just circumstances? Wondering if it’s SQ, what you found good/bad about it to wish to change, and then back again?

Long story, short version: system changes, house changes, wife changes (!). Though not quite sure of the order of significance here.

SQwise: I really liked what the Qutest (one of them) did to my then CD playback.
When I changed to the Nova a few years ago I dispensed with the Qutest, but the SN3 has brought a DAC back into the equation yet again.

I’m curious to know whether the nDAC might be a better choice or whether the Chord is the way to go. Purely in terms of rack space, it’s the Qutest, but there’s also something I like about having a Naim pairing with amp & DAC.

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Could you expand on the “wife~DAC” relationship please?

Ha! Not here. It’s a family-friendly forum, I believe.

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QBD76 HD or a Hugo Mk1 would be my choice, if your QBD76 is a HD model I’d be keen to know where you choose to sell it and some warning. :+1:

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The QBD76 wasn’t the HD model, and I sold it two or three years ago, I’m afraid.

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Both could be bought preloved, and one of those could be resold with very little or no loss…

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Indeed, these are highly subjective preferences, I suspect with quite a bit of sample variation between individual items too, especially if they are a few years old. For me the only way to be sure that you have made the right choice is to buy one and live with it for a while. Then sell it if it doesn’t float your boat.

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The DACs from Schiit pair marvelously with NAIM. Look into any of the three versions of Yggdrasil or the Bifrost 2/64.

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I second that, Bifrost is incredible for the money.

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They look rather nice, too, and would take up less rack room than the Naim.

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Don’t discount the offerings from Topping. I’m a happy D30 user - I believe it’s the best DAC I’ve owned irrespective of price. I know its tempting to be a bit wary and there’s a fair bit of controversy on various forums, but leaving all that aside they really are excellent DACs.

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Yes, I used the D30 for a while and was very impressed. I did move it on, but I did keep my L30 headphone amp.
Their customer service is top notch too

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A bit of a wildcard is a s/h Bel Canto DAC 3VB. I have the 3.7 and love the sound.

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The XPS is a very nice addition.
I haven’t tried a 555PS (yet), but that’s an additional upgrade option.

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I have acquired an nDAC, and it’s due to land this pm.

What are the best/recommended connections between DAC and SN3, and for between sources and DAC?

Currently, I am limited to RCA for the former, and both optical and coax for the latter.

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Your stated options are fine. DIN is preferable between dac and amp but if you only have RCA, its fine.
What year is it? Do you know if it has been serviced?
Perhaps ensure the ground switch is set to chassis rather than float in the absence of a Naim CD player. I think this still applies even with RCA connection.
Congrats, great purchase.

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The DAC should be supplied with a DIN5 cable which you can use to connect to any spare input on the Supernait although these are sometimes missing as sellers don’t always remember to include them. Both DAC and SN3 have RCA options which you can use if you must, but you should use DIN where possible.

The best digital input to use would be the coax SPDIF, depending on what sources you will be connecting to it.

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Yes, the seller didn’t include the DIN (it wasn’t in the listing, I’ve just checked).

By coax/SPDIF do you mean Coax or optical?