A (better sounding?) alternative to Foobar2000 -OR- A musing in the realm of bit-perfect streaming - Page 2

Originally Posted by Shike 

That article is the biggest lie in computer audio made from paranoia and little to no scientific testing.

OIC, so all the players sound the same to you...and jitter doesn't exist per se, nor is it audible of course? you're such a lucky guy.

I presume that all the opamps/cables and S/PDIF interfaces sound the same too, right?

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrRoderick 

well if you're outputting to your DAC the volume should not necessarily be an issue, since it is only outputting the bit stream. Is your primary sound driver an analog output, or is the setup the one from your sig? And to comment on mister bean, the app will not come up in windows sound mixer, nor even in the task manager, save for as a small process 'stealthaudio32.exe'. If its louder than foobar perhaps its either a. effect of dsp's in foobar (like the bauer dsp, thus 'quieting foobar'), or b. that loudness is the perception i have of 'presence'. To me it does not seem louder. Then again, turning down the knob does not hurt. :P

I set the primary device to uDAC before I installed and ran the program. It's usually set to my X-Fi sound card for gaming, with Foobar set to use the uDAC instead, but not right now. The app does show up in the volume mixer, but like any good bit-perfect player changing the volume does nothing. I've got no DSPs active in Foobar. And it's definitely not "presence" or any nonsense like that. If anything, the "presence" is a result of the volume. Causation does not equal correlation, and all that 

Ah! It's probably ReplayGain! This little no-interface player probably doesn't use it, huh?

Well, software players [b]can[/b] affect the picture quality of a movie. FACT. There are many tests showing this. I do not see why this cannot be applied to audio as there are many things 'under the hood' that affect picture quality and thus many things 'under the hood' of software digital music players that can affect the sound. Both are jsut processing digital data after all Btw, the general consensus is that Media Player Classic - Home Cinema is the best for viewing vids. VLC is so crap tbh.

People underestimate the influence of software / firmware on digital sound.

Originally Posted by Head Injury 

I don't know if it's louder for everyone else and no one's noticed

OMG, you found the reason why many ppl think it's better! that's because it's louder...yes sir, you can make bit-perfect louder, how cool is that 

I remember something about jitter only mattering at the DAC conversion stage, but I may be wrong.

@leeperry: I've never found cables to make a difference personally, aside from those with better shielding resisting mobile phone interference more than others. The actual conductor on the other hand, I haven't found to matter.

Equating opamps to the bitperfect debate seems a like comparing apples to oranges though. You're also putting words in Shike's mouth (or ears)

Quote:

Originally Posted by leeperry 

OMG, you found the reason why many ppl think it's better! that's because it's louder...yes sir, you can make bit-perfect louder, how cool is that 

You can also make it "sound better", huh?

Anyway, it was ReplayGain. But a direct comparison between the two revealed no differences as far as I'm concerned. So I'll stick with the one using the interface.

Anyway, jitter is a non-issue these days as no-one (I do mean no-one) can hear below -75dB jitter measurements and sound equipment these days is well below that.

opamps are highly highly highly influential sound wise. Can transform what an entire thing sounds like.

@Draca: I'm simply asking questions...nothing more, nothing less! Everything sounds way different to my ears, opamps/cables/bit-perfect players/digital transports...but sure I'm a crackhead like many other ppl who also hear differences, sh** happens.

even this 11yo child would prolly need medication, sadly: http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/pcaudio/messages/2/21586.html

maybe it's not too late for her

I hear differences between different software settings easily tbh. They are subtle by themselves though but if you compound a lot of subtle changes, it can result in a noticeable change.

I prefer my tweaked ASIO4ALL settings to my 02 US's native ASIO drivers tbh.

Quote:

Originally Posted by leeperry 

I'm simply asking questions...nothing more nothing less! Everything sounds way different my ears, opamps/cables/bit-perfect players/digital transports...but sure I'm a crackhead like many other ppl who also hear differences, sh** happens.

No you're not, you're just falling for placebo, which is a perfectly normal thing. If some people pass a DBT of this player and Foobar, then I'll give it more of a chance. But I'm not going to agonize for half an hour listening to songs on both trying to decide between the bit-perfect player with an interface, built-in conversion, ReplayGain, libraries, album art, etc. and the bit-perfect player that does nothing but play music in a potentially slightly better way. I hear no difference, at least not in the song I chose. But I want to stick with Foobar, so it may be reverse placebo.

ahhh, here we go! I'm falling for placebo. This thread was in bad need of threadcrapping anyway, thanks for passing by fellas...that's exactly what the OP wanted in the first place, see this thread as a troll bait

Quote:

Originally Posted by leeperry 

ahhh, here we go! I'm falling for placebo. This thread was in bad need of threadcrapping anyway, thanks for passing by fellas...that's exactly what the OP wanted in the first place, see this thread as a troll bait

Because it's always healthier conversation when everyone just agrees and moves on.

Besides, I see a question mark in his title, not an exclamation mark.

well, look at the Lilith thread, the first 6 pages are plain theadcrap...and in the last pages several ppl say that they think it does sound way better than f**bar...crackheads too?

you can measure anything in video...colorimetry, lumen output, etc etc....in audio you can hardly measure the important stuff like SS depth/width and PRaT. Saying that they all sound identical because they're bit-perfect is completely missing the picture, but maybe your gear is not transparent enough. Quite frankly, the d2k is hyped to death here on head-fi, and the miracle didn't happen when I tried it. any cable/opamp/digital transport/player will sound perfectly identical on those crappy phones.

I don't think it's the other players that sound better than f**bar, it's just f**bar that sounds terrible...it's been making the XXHighEnd's coder a rich man, he doesn't want f**bar to improve whatsoever

Originally Posted by MrRoderick 

I think it's time I set up a good DBT. I'll let you guys know! And take it easy with the passions!

Good idea.