The DacMagic Is BackAnother DAC for audio lovers on a tight budget
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Cambridge Audio introduced the original DacMagic in 1994 with the specific intention of upgrading CD players. It was received to great acclaim and spawned several incarnations. The digital music revolution means the CD is just one format as people listen to their collection in a totally different way. Therefore, the time is right for a renaissance.
The spiritual successor to the originalDacMagic allows a range of applications such as PCs, Media Center PCs, network music devices and sound bridges to benefit from a DAC's ability to bring downloaded and compressed content to life. By connecting to games consoles including PlayStations (PS2 and PS3) Xbox and Xbox360s, a new dimension can be given to gaming via dramatically improved soundtracks and special effects. . All these products can be connected concurrently via USB, S/PDIF and Toslink. Once upsampled, the DacMagic offers both unbalanced RCA and balanced XLR outputs for the best quality analogue transfer.
Some specs:
• Two inputs with both S/PDIF & Toslink sockets allow a wide range of digital sources to be
connected such as network music devices, games consoles, CD/DVD players and other digital music devices
• USB input connects direct to PC without drivers to act as a very high quality
DAC/soundcard providing genuine hi-fi quality playback from desktop or Windows Media Center PCs
• Adapted Time Filtering (ATF™) asynchronous upsampling technology converts 16-24 bit audio (at any standard sampling frequency between 32-96kHz) to 24 bit/192kHz
• 32 bit Texas Instruments Digital Signal Processor (DSP)
• Dual Differential Virtual Earth balanced filter topology – low order two pole linear-phased Bessel filter takes advantage of high sampling rate achieved
• Twin Wolfson WM8740 high quality DACs in dual differential mode for excellent stereoimaging
• Incoming sampling rate indicator 32 / 44.1 / 48 / 88.2 / 96kHz
• Choice of filters – linear phase, minimum phase and steep filter can all be selected to suit an individual's listening preferences
• Phase select to invert or reinvert input, correcting possible recording problems
• Singled ended phono and XLR balanced audio outputs
• Digital output (S/PDIF and Toslink concurrently) passes through selected source for recording purposes
• Substantial aluminium front panel plus an entirely new ultra rigid, acoustically dampened chassis
http://www.cambridgeaudio.com/summary.php?PID=320Hi-Fi Choice gave it a 5 star review.