Difference between Microsoft Windows (Vista) volume control and FB2K's volume control - Page 3

roller, do you not use replay gain either then? Isn't replay gain also a form of digital attenuation in itself?

No mikolayer, I don't use ReplayGain either.

@geremy: I also have a mini3 gathering dust somewhere - the pot is useless. I expected the M^3's to be more usable.. ah, but looks can be deceiving.

@MikoLayer: Yes, RG usually attenuates (to prevent clipping and/or normalize loudness) but it can also boost (if the track and your settings allow). ;)

Many of you are really dead wrong about digital volume controls. Analog volume controls have a host of problems that digital ones do not have.

Volume mismatch at low volumes in particular, many low grade analog volumes have image wandering issues even at moderate volumes when the volume is changed.

If you are powering headphones through an analog volume where the volume control is in the path between the headphone amp & headphone (more common than I would like to see) the frequency response of the headphone can be altered at different volumes.

If a passive volume control is placed between two componants the passive volume control will interact with the cabling to produce high frequency losses at the most likely volume levels to be used.

If you use a high quality fixed resistor switched volume control you may not have adaquate volume level choises to get the volume you need for your particular music.

Digital volume controls correct all these issues, in Windows Vista & Seven you can set the sound system to use 24 bits so you would have no loss at any usable volume. You would have to go down to levels that are unlistenable before there are any bits lost at the bottom of the volume scale. Most music now days is mixed & mastered on systems with digital volume controls so if there was really any loss here the damage is already done on most modern music anyway. Just because a mixing console has a physical volume pot does not mean that the volume is analog. Many times these pots only control a software (I.E. digital) volume control that happens to have floating point precision where no bits are lost even if you turn the pot all the way down. You can recover a sound even after the file has been saved with these systems as all the bits are still there.

The foobar volume control has finer increments than the windows volume control does & as such is easier to get the perfect volume for the particular selection of music. Windows volume control seems to only give about 50 levels whereas the foobar control has practically unlimited volume levels.

Genuine question out of curiosity: are those push button + and - volume controls on portable amps like FiiO E5 / E7 considered digital or analog? (My guess is analog since the source signal is already analog at that point.)

Follow up question for anyone who happens to have inside knowledge on MP3 players: Does the volume control on these players attenuate like the E5 or like Windows?

Those push buttons control a pot through the I²C interface, so yes, it's an analog volume control. (NwAvGuy's one had almost 4 dB imbalance with the bass boost off)

Afaik, the Clip+ (with very good channel balance) has a digital volume control for example.

I just learned something new. :)  I previously thought that I2C was only for digital control of DACs, but I see that it's used for all sorts of other things. Well, I suppose it is a digital control, but for an analog pot. Anyway, much appreciated.