Quote:
Originally Posted by
stv014 
Well, I would rather not invest in something when the only argument in its favor is "there is 0 credible evidence that it is useful, but you cannot prove with 100.0000% certainty that it is useless".
It is wise to use caution especially when spending money on tweaks, a lot of them are nonsense or actually perform badly and colour the sound because this is easier than designing something that works better objectively as that requires engineering knowledge. There is also the issue of spending money on something that will make a very small difference when you could be spending money on things that are more important.
Computer audio software fall into neither of these traps though, save for maybe the differences being too small for some systems and measurements to provide proof positive. Avoid the snake oil and spending money by all means, but IMO there is no benefit in being dismissive of things that are free to try, there is just a risk involved that the change will be negative, so you would need to use critical listening skills to make sense of this.
Out of interest is there any evidence that bitperfect playback is measurably better than direct sound? (I know this isn't your argument but just as a general question) If you compare the two by ear the difference is similar in magnitude to changing other computer settings, just the premise is easier to swallow.