Seems a bit harsh. He was polite and concise and the comparison isn't unreasonable.
Lots of folks around here still favor the various Parasound DACs over much more expensive and more modern units, so the consensus will almost certainly be to go that way. Your sound card has an optical out, so you can use that connection.
In general, cheap USB DACs tend to leave something to be desired. Even better examples like the Cambridge Audio DACMagic measure much worse over that interface than over either their RCA or Toslink inputs.
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