DAC3 Review - Alan Sircom, hi-fi+

"A Damn Good, No-Frills Digital Converter"

"Benchmark Media Systems’ no-nonsense approach to all things audio is rare today. The company doesn’t make products with mind-bogglingly heavy chassis. It doesn’t use components made by the Capacitor Ancients or circuit boards resting on magic pads made from panda eyelashes. It doesn’t charge its customers like a wounded buffalo. And it doesn’t opt for rare file formats that no one has ever used, despite enthusiasts thinking they sound clever."

ESS Conversion with 3.5 dB of Added Headroom

"The beating heart of the Benchmark Media Systems DAC3 B is the ESS Technologies’ ES9028PRO converter chip. The DAC3 B runs internal digital processing and conversion at 32-bits, summing the ESS chip’s eight converters into two output channels."

"The DAC3 B has 3.5dB of headroom above 0dBFS, meaning the DAC3 B has overload protection not seen on other DACs."

"With all that digital headroom on tap, the DAC3 B shines in a way almost all other DACs cannot."

"That extra few dB above full-scale means the DAC isn’t screaming in pain at 0dB… and neither are you.

"Leave No Trace"

"It also has the latest version of Benchmark’s jitter attenuation system (UltraLock3) and doubles down on the digital demon with its multi-mode asynchronous USB system."

"Benchmark also uses the distortion compensation facilities built into the ESS chip to reduce second and third order distortion."

"The net result is a DAC that delivers lower distortion, lower noise, less passband ripple, faster signal switching and locking onto signals and a more linear frequency response."

"The Benchmark Media Systems DAC3 B is very much in the ‘leave no trace’ school of good audio."

"This all sounds like ‘damning with faint praise’ and it’s not meant to be, but the DAC3 B’s signal-processing goals are so at odds with what audiophiles have come to expect from a DAC it’s hard to describe the performance of a DAC that is singularly competent. It doesn’t trade bass for speed or accuracy for excitement and consequently those wedded to one of these aspects of a musical presentation will find the DAC3 B wanting. It isn’t at all. Yes, if you compare it to a DAC that has been artificially tailored to produce a particular sound, it won’t sound the same, but that doesn’t mean the tailored one is ‘right’. "

The fit and finish of the DAC3 B is very ‘studio’ (there’s even optional rack-mount ‘ears’ that help reinforce that pro-audio heritage).

"Uniformly Good"

"This is a DAC that’s uniformly good at everything. It resolves well, has good imaging properties."

"It makes a balanced, honest sound that allows you to sit and listen to music for hours. That is what makes Benchmark’s products consistently popular with audio engineers. You don’t want ‘bright’ if you sit at a mixing desk 10 hours a day. "

Adding an LA4

"I would have stayed being ‘okay’ with the DAC3 B were it not for another box that came with the DAC. The small LA4 balanced line preamplifier also has ‘studio-chummy’ styling, and also happens to be one of the most transparent preamps I’ve heard."

"Putting the two Benchmark products together suddenly made the DAC3 B talk sense to me."

"Couple a DAC with no intrinsic character with a preamp that does the same and suddenly that neutrality is something to strive for. There’s no magic here… just cool-headed enlightenment. And it’s great."

"Maybe it took the fabulous LA4 preamp to see that neutrality in a positive light, but once there, it’s hard to step back."

- Alan Sircom, hi-fi+

Read the full review at hi-fi+