The GDA-600 has been discontinued by Adcom and replaced by the GDA-700. The main difference is that the 700 is HDCD compatible. Many audiophile magazines quote that the GDA-600 is "nothing short of a steal", and I agree. It can be found used for half (or less) of its retail price of $750. I have compared this units peformance, build quality, and features to other more costly units and can see no reason why I would want to part with this gem - HDCD or no HDCD!In my opinion, the jury is still out regarding HDCD capabiities!! I have listened to both HDCD and non-HDCD. I would rather go with a well recorded and mastered disc any day! And.....what, 1 out of every 10,000 discs are HDCD encoded? The 600 has all the inputs (except AT&T glass). It weighs about 10 lbs. and has an aluminum faceplate. Highly recommended!

I've been owner of this unit for several years now and it has been a great and very flexible DAC. I used this mainly for recording and listening. I use the DAC between my CD player and my minidisc player so I could get a better result by using a seperate DAC. I recommend this to everyone who is limited in their budget. Good job ADCOM!

Heard one of these puppies in a showroom after the place closed. A buddy of mine works there and we spent the night drinking beer and doing A/B test with every piece of equipment in the store.
Now that I've tossed out any chance of anybody taking me seriously I can tell you the GDA-600 is an awesome unit. What impressed me the most about this DAC was the awesome soundstage it created and almost 3-dimensional quality. Doing side by side listening tests with Pioneer Elites and Marantz there was no question the Adcom unit was sonically superior. Sometimes you have to strain to hear differences in D/A conversion. Not with the Adcom.

Very musical sound...

None yet.

I wasn't sure that an external D/A converter would be able to improve the 2-channel sound over my new Sony STR-DB930, but the Adcom GDA-600 provided a clear improvement in sound over the Sony D/A chips.

Sounds were much more clearly defined, instruments were more distinct, bass was more controlled and precise, as well as less boomy. Definitely recommended.

value, overall presentation

touch of grain, not too transparent

this baby is an absolute steal for the money. new it was a bargain, and now, used, I see it for 200 or less. unbelievable. cannot be beat for the money. my theta gear tromps it, but hey, it costs lotsa dough...it better.

Similar Products Used:

marantz cd63, proceed pdp 2 and pdt 2, theta separates, rotel 855

I have to agree with Joe from New York. I've had the Adcom for a number of years. It's a great bargain. You'd be hard pressed to find anything equal at it's price.

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Budget Digital Front-End

Objectives were:
- Provide convenient access to my music library – read: use a mega-changer as transport
- Stay in budget: <$750

I spare you the trials and errors, here is what I ended up with:

- Pioneer PD-F1039 300+1 CD Changer as transport (new, $230)
- XLO ER/TOS TOS-Link optical digital cable, 1m (new, $39)
- Monarchy Audio DIP MK II as jitter reducer/format converter (demo, $169)
- Apogee Wyde Eye balanced XLR AES/EBU digital cable, 0.5m (new, $25)
- Adcom GDP-600 DAC (used, $220)

Total cost, excl. tax/shipping: $683

I am very happy with the musicality of this combo, the somewhat harsh sound of the Pioneer CD transport is nicely opened up by the smooth Adcom DAC. Not surprisingly, the Adcom DAC really makes a big difference compared to the DAC in the Pioneer CD changer. It has dual Burr Brown PCM-63 and can digest various input formats. The Pioneer has only a optical digital out, but the Monarchy DIP acts as digital format translator from S/PDIF TOS-Link to AES/EBU via XLR.

The cable choices are classics in the value category, could not hear any significant improvements with other cables in this set-up – probably limited by the CD changer as transport.

Highly Recommended.

Remaining equipment:
- Kimber Hero interconnects, 1m
- NAD C340 integrated amplifier
- Kimber 4VS speaker cables, 12 foot runs
- Linn Helix speakers with matching Linn stands

Similar Products Used:

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