High-Resolution Digital Gets Cheaper
By Stereophile Staff June 28, 1998 — On June 23, Burr-Brown Corp. announced the PCM1728 digital-to-analog converter (DAC), designed for consumer and professional audio applications.

According to Burr-Brown, the PCM1728 offers "the industry's best price/performance ratio of any 24-bit audio DAC," and is intended for mid- to high-performance digital audio applications needing 96kHz sampling rates with 24-bit audio data. Such products include DVD players, AV receivers, surround-sound home-theater systems, and CD players. In addition, this DAC can be used for professional audio systems, including digital mixing consoles and effects processors.

"The PCM1728 reinforces Burr-Brown's position as the industry leader in price/performance mixed-signal audio integrated circuits by offering the audio-system designer high performance without a high price tag," said Mike Centorino, audio product marketing manager at Burr-Brown.

The new DAC has a 106dB dynamic range, as well as a newly developed "enhanced multilevel delta-sigma modulator" architecture that the company says improves audio dynamic performance and reduces jitter sensitivity in audio applications, resulting in higher performance. The chip's internal digital filter operates at 8x-oversampling at a 96kHz sampling rate.

The DAC also accepts 16/20/24-bit input data formats and can be used with a variety of audio clocks. In addition, the PCM1728 processes 24 bits internally and has single-ended analog outputs, which reduces the amount of external components required in an audio system, according to Burr-Brown.