220 to 440 ROI

[ray1234]

I think we are mixing a few concepts here:

1. DC (Analog to Digital Converter) is a concept that is not common for amplifiers. Devialet uses this because their patented ADH circuit works with digital input.
2. ADC flow is only used when there is an analog input in use. For AES, USB, ETHERNET, SPDIF, and Coax inputs, there is no usage of ADC.
3. When you use a streamer or DDC and feed Devialet via AES, the DAC (Digital to Analog Converter) is still inside of Devialet. What you do is feed Devialet with a digital signal, which Devialet converts to analog to produce the sound signal that you listen to. At this stage, your streamer's DAC is not in use or functioning, and any clock that you put ahead of Devialet has no impact on the DAC operation Devialet performs.

All in all, there is no way to improve the DAC and Clock quality of Expert Pro, and it's the same DAC and Clock (as far as we are aware) inside of Astra. Basically, whichever way you feed Devialet digitally, you always get the same outcome. You can say that there are differences between USB vs. SPDIF vs. Ethernet vs. AES, and yes, the handshakes, medium and signal processing of the inputs are different and the jitter etc. will be different. However, the difference you hear has nothing to do with the DAC or clock; it is more related to how well your streamer/PC/device's output performs and produces less noise/jitter etc. with Devialet's specific input.

I don't quite agree with your point 3, AES does pass on clock signals together with the audio data to the Devialet. Of course, I can't quantify how much the clock is improving the streamer signal and how much it is improving the DAC. In any case, with the help of the clock, the resolution of my D400 is up to the standard of modern DACs, I am talking DCS and MSB levels.