[kimosabe]

Ironic tagline quote of Stephen Wolfram.
 
Tom's is well known for objective, appropriate test design.
As in all things, you can invest orders of magnitude of effort (here, $) squeezing out the last 0.000001% of performance or efficiency from a system.
I see no reason to resort to infantile mudslinging.
Let it be.

 

[mistersprinkles]

Mudslinging? 

There's too much political correctess in this world my friend and I will have no part in it. I call ducks ducks and I call morons morons. 
Sorry if that offends you

 

[KERBY]

  Just wow. I could appreciate an argument on severely diminishing returns once above a certain baseline but the 1st time I used a very modest amp/DAC combo I was transfixed for hours. I was hearing details in my favorite songs that I simply had never heard before and switching back to onboard audio I simply could not hear those same details in the same song. Implementation? Better power supply? Ability to amplify? All of the above? Don't know but I've never looked back ....

would like to buy your modest amp dac combo and have the same experience too
 
 
hehehe thanks

 

[Chodi]

Tom's does a nice job of evaluating computer gear. I find it useful for that. They know squat about high end audio and nothing about the audible difference in high end dac's. Those of us that enjoy this hobby know the difference and can easily hear the difference between a computer sound card and a quality stand along dac. If they can't hear the difference they are hearing deprived or perhaps they think Mp3 is the endgame format. I would admit if you are listening to lossy recordings on modest midfi gear you might not hear any difference. If they were listening to decent quality recordings in flac or direct from cd then their comments are worthless and they embarrass their publication by making such declarations. 

 

[mistersprinkles]

  Tom's does a nice job of evaluating computer gear. I find it useful for that. They know squat about high end audio and nothing about the audible difference in high end dac's. Those of us that enjoy this hobby know the difference and can easily hear the difference between a computer sound card and a quality stand along dac. If they can't hear the difference they are hearing deprived or perhaps they think Mp3 is the endgame format. I would admit if you are listening to lossy recordings on modest midfi gear you might not hear any difference. If they were listening to decent quality recordings in flac or direct from cd then their comments are worthless and they embarrass their publication by making such declarations. 

 
I like you. Let's be friends!
 
Seriously though, Tom's Hardware, which I find flawed in most of it's PC reviews, has NO business talking about audio. Most PC people- hell, most musicians even, have no idea what good sound is. 
 
I had a friend who used to say he was an audiophile. The first time I went to his house he played me 128kbps MP3's and said "Anything higher bitrate is a waste of hard drive space". I explained to him very carefully that he was not an audiophile. 
 
I try not to take anybody seriously unless they can really convince me that they know their rear end from their elbow.

 

[Chodi]

   
I like you. Let's be friends!
 
Seriously though, Tom's Hardware, which I find flawed in most of it's PC reviews, has NO business talking about audio. Most PC people- hell, most musicians even, have no idea what good sound is. 
 
I had a friend who used to say he was an audiophile. The first time I went to his house he played me 128kbps MP3's and said "Anything higher bitrate is a waste of hard drive space". I explained to him very carefully that he was not an audiophile. 
 
I try not to take anybody seriously unless they can really convince me that they know their rear end from their elbow.

It seems you and I may agree on this subject although I would not agree with your point about musicians. I just wanted to call attention to the fact that you have redefined the meaning of "lurker" since you have 55 posts in 9 years of membership. You must be passionate about this subject to make one of your rare posts. Welcome back.

 

[genclaymore]

   
I like you. Let's be friends!
 
Seriously though, Tom's Hardware, which I find flawed in most of it's PC reviews, has NO business talking about audio. Most PC people- hell, most musicians even, have no idea what good sound is. 
 
I had a friend who used to say he was an audiophile. The first time I went to his house he played me 128kbps MP3's and said "Anything higher bitrate is a waste of hard drive space". I explained to him very carefully that he was not an audiophile. 
 
I try not to take anybody seriously unless they can really convince me that they know their rear end from their elbow.

My dad is like that even tho hes has experience with computer hardware, His mind is stuck in the 90s, Always trying to convince me how stuff work when they don't work like that today. Don't even try to talk to him about Gpus, He tried to once force a FX5200 on to me when I had to return a X800 pro, going that the FX5200 is good enough for gaming and the X800XL was a cad card. That FX5200 set on that kitchen table in it box til he returned it for the X800XL.
 
Tho that not as bad as him taking some Logitech Z5500 ruining them by cutting the cables of the speakers as well creative speakers and then connection them to the speaker wire connections on a Yamaha receiver, instead of going out and getting some book self speakers made within spec and connect them into the receiver. In fact i willing to bet my dad has a collection of 128kbps audio on his comp and would prolly say the same thing your friend says.

 

[BeatsWork]

  would like to buy your modest amp dac combo and have the same experience too
 
 
hehehe thanks

 
Sold many moons ago - and have been chasing the next OMG moment ever since

 

[Tablix]

Modest dac/amp combo can be bought for under $300 and for the above 5 posters, you really need to understand you can buy an audio interface for under $600 that will be more than adequate for a music PRODUCER, and 99.9% of listener's would have NFI.  We are no longer living in the 20th century and if your ears can pick out that level of detail, maybe consider an audio engineer course.

 

[BeatsWork]

  Modest dac/amp combo can be bought for under $300 and for the above 5 posters, you really need to understand you can buy an audio interface for under $600 that will be more than adequate for a music PRODUCER, and 99.9% of listener's would have NFI.  We are no longer living in the 20th century and if your ears can pick out that level of detail, maybe consider an audio engineer course.

 
Completely agree which was my earlier point on rapidly diminishing returns above a certain baseline. The difference between $300 rack and onboard audio is massive. Between $300 and $600 very noticeable. Between $600 and $1400 significant with the right source material and headphones BUT you start to get quite frustrated with mastering as every flaw is quite apparent and quality so varied. And quite happy stopping here ......

 

[Tablix]

For playback I disagree, an Asus Xonar STX will sound prety damn awesome, and is more than good enough for 95% of the worlds population, most people cant tell the difference between on board audio and and STX due to the cans or speakers they are using.  Audiophiles are so up themselves they should porn their golden ears  Unless you are a actually mastering tracks any "hi-fi" dac above $100 should suffice, until you start spending thousands on your end of chain, be it monitors or headphones

 

[mistersprinkles]

  For playback I disagree, an Asus Xonar STX will sound prety damn awesome, and is more than good enough for 95% of the worlds population, most people cant tell the difference between on board audio and and STX due to the cans or speakers they are using.  Audiophiles are so up themselves they should porn their golden ears  Unless you are a actually mastering tracks any "hi-fi" dac above $100 should suffice, until you start spending thousands on your end of chain, be it monitors or headphones

 
 
....... uh.... No. I have $550 headphones and $700 speakers and I can hear the difference from a $300 DAC (rPAC) to a $600 DAC ( UD 301). $100 DAC? Like what? A D1? Garbage. Sorry. Garbage.

 

[cel4145]

....... uh.... No. I have $550 headphones and $700 speakers and I can hear the difference from a $300 DAC (rPAC) to a $600 DAC ( UD 301). $100 DAC? Like what? A D1? Garbage. Sorry. Garbage.

Have you ever ABX tested? Might not be as easy to pick out the difference between your DACs as you think.

 

[oneway23]

And folks in the hi-fi world continue to wonder why there seems to be a general difficulty in gathering new people into the hobby...

 

[phoenixdogfan]

The only reason to buy an expensve DAC is for the variety of connection options it has.  Otherwise any competently implemented DAC with a flat frequency response and and sufficiently high S/N ratio will sound identical.
 
Think you hear a difference and  you're unwilling to  chalk it up to the power of suggestion, then spend away!
 
Otherwise buy a properly-designed DAC and Amp with the connectivity you need (which is just about everything on the market of recent vintage), sufficient power to drive the rig you have, and with the form factor you desire, and don't spend any more than you have to, because these products are really just commodities.