This is a succinct review of the Benchmark DAC-1. We bought it and tested it with an audiophile friend of mine.
I will not go into technical detail since I am not an engineer. I chose this DAC based on the available literature and its very affordable price---I have a good horse sense for hunting down equipment which performs way beyond its price point.
The jitter immunity and built in headphone amplifier, ample gain to drive a power amp without a separate preamp are very attractive features and the 30 day return guarantee is most reassuring.
My initial impressions: sparkling transparency, meticulous detail, unbridled dynamics, compared to my Sony 930 XE (European version, battery-powered with mods), which was the CD player of the year on the Old Continent in 1999 and is considered to be a serious player.
The DAC-1 sounded as if a veil were removed from the music; I was listening through a wide, open window, as opposed to eavesdropping through closed doors before.
Was I a hundred percent satisfied? Not initially. There was a certain leanness in the midrange; it lacked the lushness and bloominess characteristic of analogue playback and tube-based digital systems (which, on the other hand, usually sacrifice detail and transparency).
Benchmark explains this midrange thinness as as a lack of “lower midrange grunge” which plagues many a digital converter. I attributed this to the ability of the Benchmark to reveal the innate shortcomings of the digital recording—a candid, faithful revelation of the original source.
The Benchmark has an internal power supply and comes with a stock power cord. This means that its performance must be dependent, to some extent, on the quality of the power which is fed into it. Our favourable experiences with the Cardas Golden Reference Power cord led to the obvious trial of one of these cords, on the Benchmark. The result was nothing short of breathtaking: the sound blossomed and acquired a lushness which is the coveted attribute of analogue. The background is exceptionally quiet, the voices and instruments have palpable space around them, the treble is ethereal: the last vestige of harshness is expunged from digital. This rivals the best analogue and even transcends it in some ways, by eliminating the noise and the distortion. The music flows effortlessly and exudes the aura of the live performance.
Those people who scoffed at, or were lackadaisical about the Benchmark DAC-1, including the hasty and superficial reviewer of Stereophile, have only heard it with the stock power cord. If one wants to drive the unit to its full potential, one needs to use a quality power cord.
We compared the Benchmark DAC1 to the Sony SCD-1 which has one of the best DAC’s built and the two sounded virtually identical. The DAC was run through the coaxial output of the SCD-1. My friend owns a Philips SCD-1000 and finds the DAC-1 more transparent and revealing.
There are certain requirements to be met when using this DAC, if one wishes to unleash its magic:
1. It is very sensitive to different transports: the better the transport, the better the sound. One does not have to use a megabuck transport, however; we had spectecular results with the Pioneer 525 DVP and it got even better with the Harman Cardon 7600 CDP. The Sony 930 XE did not perform as well.
2. It is sensitive to the type of digital cable used: we tried a Radio Shack cable first, which was acceptable; the sound vastly improved with a custom-made cheap video cable and finally, became totally transparent and engaging by switching to a Cardas reference silver cable. We have not tried the unit yet with an optical cable.
3. You have to use a top notch power cord. The quality of the cord which has as profound an effect on the sound as the transport and the digital cable combined.
4. The built in headphone amplifier is stellar and gets you to audio nirvana if you drive Grado RS-1 headphones with it. I tried the Sennheiser HD-600 as well but this headphone is not in the same league with the Grado: sounds muffled and compressed in comparison.
Our conclusion is that the Benchmark will push 16/44 playback technology to its limits and is as good as it gets in a 24 bit/96 KHz converter. I have absolutely no motivation to fool around with analogue any longer, having achieved fully satisfying musicality with digital playback and even question the superiority of SACD over a high quality 16 bit recording decoded by this DAC, if the rest of the equipment is up to par.
Associated equipment: Sony 930 XE CDP, Sony SCD-1, Pioneer 525 DVP, Harman Kardon 7600 CDP as transports, 2 Odyssey Stereo Stratos in biamplified configuration, Energy Audyssey APS 5+2 speakers biamped and biwired, custom-made silver cables and interconnects, Monster HTS 2500 power conditioner
