• That strongly depends on the headphones you’re buying. It’s not like the same old HD audio chip in every laptop and desktop since the 2010 has anything better. The difference between a $15 DAC and a $150 DAC is the gold laminated capacitors glued to the side for show, they usually come with the same chips

    Most 3.5mm-to-USB-C converters come with a fine DAC as long as you buy the $15 one instead of the $2 one. You can get the official Apple dongle for like ten bucks and that sounds absolutely fine.

    There are some phones with built-in DACs that come with passive adapters, those are super cheap and still work fine, but come with the frustrating “why does this adapter only work with some specific phones” side effect.