A lot of wildly contradicting claims here...

That's gonna be your chain. I use SS amps and mostly silver cables and still don't get any sibilance.

I've said it before, but to get the best out the HM1 make, sure your DAC outputs 5-6v minimum. The headroom is almost limitless, and the more input signal you give it, the more power that gets to the headphones.

Very curious how resolving and how far scaling these actually are. I enjoyed my DianaTCs a lot, but they definitely lost that game to Susvara and one had to go.

At 50 Ohms that seems a but doubtful, but who knows. I think the MR was designed for compatibility with portable devices.

I did have an MSB Discrete next to my EMM Labs DA2, and the EMM was the better DAC and more to my tastes personally. The Premier is probably more on par, but MSB is a warmer, chunkier, and "gooer" sound. The DSD DACs tend to be more fast and fluid, and smoother, but less warm. The DA2 was much...

My understanding is they upsample to a really high PCM rate, do some proprietary filters, then to DSD and to the converter at a super high rate. It is a bit opaque, but I know that much is true. Playback seems mostly the same, but slightly different filter algorithm, and they downsample back...

I've heard similar things, but it is surprising that some software would do a better job than Playback/EMM's algorithms, since that is their primary game. Could be that it moves the processing noise out of the DAC. I do know that not all DSD upsamplers are equal. The much lauded HQPlayer never...

Yeah, you definitely don't want more than one Master Fuse in your system, maybe two if it super dark or muddy. Pink replaces Purple, and the Master complements both.

There are definitely changes in sound with the different plate designs etc over the years. IMO the best Mullards are 1950s and 60s, esp the long plates. 70s are are very good too. The easiest to find an cheapest are 80s short/box plate military manufacture, and they are are not as good, but they...

Don't listen to any of the other ones.

Since I'm too risk averse for the Swiss Digital, I'm really curious how those Synergistic Pink fuses sound once people start using them.

I wouldn't doubt that this sounds the best vs fuses. But, this one actually seems too risky for me. If that breaker fails at all, ever, for any reason...you, your gear, and home are in danger.

Thinking of the HM1, I did find there are tweaks to remedy most of the things Koji didn't like. DAC synergy, fuses, and esp grounding both chassis to something like a Shunyata Altaira bring out deeper black background and more musical quality. It seems like what makes it sound more pro-audio in...

I haven't watched them all, but it seemed like from the get-go he did not favor the HM1 over the Bliss, his tube amps, or later the Wells. That much seems consistent. I think he also preferred the Bliss over AHB2. It does seem that he went through a process of escalating higher and more...