ЦАПы — Analog Domain The DAC1

The DAC1 is a converter made by Analog Domain, the German high-end company led by chief designer Angel Despotov, best known for its amplifiers. It is an asynchronous design that converts every input format to one internal format before conversion. Analog Domain focused on maximising performance with existing recordings, most of which are at 44.1 kHz and 16 bits, while supporting high-resolution formats.

Key specs that matter

It accepts PCM up to 192 kHz/24-bit over S/PDIF and AES/EBU, and up to 768 kHz/32-bit and DSD64 to DSD512 over USB. The DAC1 offers USB, AES/EBU, optical and twin coaxial digital inputs, and outputs are two RCA and two XLR. Conversion uses eight AK4493 chips in dual mono. Internally, data is resampled to a high constant rate of up to 940 kHz. The DAC stage is differential, and full-scale output is 2 Vrms. Residual distortion is about 0.00035% at full scale, falling to 0.0001% at -10 dBFS. Analog Domain states a dynamic range of about 130 dB.

Engineering and use context

All input data, whatever the format, is converted to 24 bits and asynchronously resampled to a very high rate. DSD is unpacked, converted to PCM and resampled. The resampled data then passes through a digital filter configured for the converter's output format, so there are no user-selectable filter modes. The filter upsamples further to raise the DAC chip's data rate as high as possible, pushing digital noise far above the audio band and removing the need for a steep analogue reconstruction filter. The three digital blocks, sample rate converter, filter and DAC, are synchronised to one high-precision clock. Because of this architecture, jitter in the incoming data becomes practically irrelevant, and any CD transport can be used without external reclocking. Distortion stays consistent across all input formats. Analog Domain argues that low distortion at low levels matters most, since a 16-bit system works at 14-bit resolution or less during quiet passages, and states that a signal 130 dB below the 2 Vrms full scale, about 0.7 microvolts, is below the input noise of many amplifiers.

Pairing

The balanced output suits Analog Domain's own amplifiers and any preamplifier with balanced inputs. S/PDIF and AES/EBU inputs accept CD transports without reclocking, and USB connects a computer.

Alternatives

Analog Domain has no other standalone digital-to-analogue converter in its range.