soon to order Solo

Hi EDMCR, good question!

Hi pompeyexile! I must assume you want the Onkyo ND-S1 to use it with an iPod/iPhone/etc. The Onkyo unit will extract the digital information from the various Apple units and allow you to send the digital information to an external DAC (V-DAC, Dacmagic, etc) to convert the files to analog which in turn you would feed the amp(s) of your choice.

As an option you could go with a Pure i-20 Dock ( http://www.pure.com/products/product.asp?Product=VL-61429&Category= ). The i-20 has an internal DAC, based on what I have read it is not as good as the Dacmagic's but it will allow you to experiment at a much lower price point and then if you decide to pursue it then you could add the Dacmagic or whatever.

If you keep your music in your PC/MAC which you probably do since you have an iPod or similar then you may wish to avoid the entire i-Dock and use an Squeezebox Duet or Touch to stream music from you PC/MAC. The internal DAC on the Touch or Duet can do 24/96 and it is quite good, of course later you could buy a high end DAC if you so choose.

The advantage of the Duet or Touch is that it opens up a lot of Radio Station Streaming music via the internet. The Squeeze Box products do not require your PC/MAC to be on when streaming music from the internet radio stations.

I have both systems and use the dock/dac arrangement in my office at work and the Squeezebox at home. Hope this additional options help.

I suppose the obvious answer is upgrade the Solo and add a DAC later. That is if course if adding a DAC at all will improve the sound.

I would agree with that choice - I do think that will offer the best "sound for the pound".

Although you mention that your Solo is connected to the tape out of your amp I see no mention of your source - one assumes a CD player? and that the connection to the tape out is a convenience that allows use of source with either the Solo or a speaker system.

FWIW - I have messed around with a number of DACs and read many reports on many different DACs as well as listening to many on friends differing systems - many of these use their DACs to interface computer based systems, my feeling is that it requires a fair investment in a DAC to significantly outclass a competent CD player.

In that respect, if the objective is to improve on the ipod dock or access computer sources, then the Dacmagic might prove quite acceptable (the Audio GD products receive very good press out here and a number are price competitive with the DM), if however, the objective in the longer term is to improve on a decent CDP, then the bar might need raising somewhat - the new Rega DAC is receiving rather good press.

I do not own a DAC or CDP that betters my analogue setup, but the investment is not as great either.  My preferred DAC is a DIY job with many mods and is now sounding quite good, the total investment in that is now a deal more than the cost of a DM and a number of parts used are now virtually unobtainable so it would be difficult to recommend it.

For a memory refresh, I have just now done a quick comparison between the analogue out of a modded Marantz CD 52 SE and a modded Beresford Caiman (the mods would take its cost to around the DM and have received significant following elsewhere), I also compared it to the analogue out of a semi-pro soundcard that uses the Envy 24 chip and AKM hard codecs.  While I might have felt that a slight edge went to the Caiman v the soundcard, (depending on the digital cable used and the output board selected - I tried the "Gator" discrete board and the modified stock board with changed caps and THS 4032 opamps) the difference v the CDP were largely of slightly differing "flavour".  Testing was done using both inputs on the Solo to allow quick switching and I reran 2 different tracks, one classical, one pop.  The only significant advantage of the DAC was multiple inputs and the possibility of using the variable output as a preamp or for level matching.   There was no appreciable benefit in SQ over the standalone player. 

Reverting to my preferred DAC, there was an obvious step up in SQ, though it OTOH, does not offer the same flexibility WRT inputs and volume control.

Hope some of this is helpful.

Edited by tg - 17 Jul 2011 at 5:50am