There is no reason why a 271 like card couldn't have been built for the 861. It would be exactly the same thing (it's a technicality of powering it and passing 24/96 over the bus). No different than ID41. Put all the MIPs you need on that card.

So MIPS wouldn't be the reason.

Now things like MRC and upsampling might have to be disabled to pass through that architecture (that might not have been acceptable), but that's the case more or less now with the external 271 bypassing 861 completely for MQA.

So it's either an architecture problem or a marketing problem, but it ain't MIPS.

You can blame lack of MIPS for lack of a software decoder for 861. But for a card, no.

- Fiddler (IMHO)

If you think listening to music is fun, try learning an instrument.
HT: G61RSL, 4x5K, 5.5KHC, 2xSC6000, Transporter, HD621, Philips BDP7501 4K, Tivo, 65" LG OLED 4K C6
Computer: Foobar2000, 5K, Mojo, HiFiMan HE1000 V2