Dan Clark Audio Stealth Review, Interview, Measurements

[Alcophone]

Cardi B is the greatest lyricist of our time

 

[qboogie]

Mmmhmmm *clenches fist* she's aiiiight. I prefer Jean Grae myself

@Ciggavelli will tell you, folks here tend to react rather colorfully when they say they listen to rap/hiphop on their TOTL hifi gear

 

[David A Silva]

Personally, I'm surprised we all can't get behind - to each his own.

 

[ra990]

Mmmhmmm *clenches fist* she's aiiiight. I prefer Jean Grae myself

@Ciggavelli will tell you, folks here tend to react rather colorfully when they say they listen to rap/hiphop on their TOTL hifi gear

Kendrick's new album is awesome and apparently it was mastered on the Audeze MM-500! That deserves to be played back on TOTL hifi gear.

 

[801evan]

The bump in distortion in that region adds a bit of that bass punch/tactile feeling that users tend to find pleasing and familiar.

The bump in 'distortion' in that region is not distortion, but rather the room resonance if ur talking about speakers in a room.

If your talking about the Stealth, the bump is there to counter the lower distortion performance of the Stealth in area, leading to unfamiliarity. So the bump is a counter move to the lack of distortion, not distortion itself.

While that bump may not show on the frequency response but does show on the distortion plot, the effect on the user is an increase in bass perception.

So the bump actually shows in the FR plot and not in the distortion plot, if related to the Stealth.

If you are talking speakers, then you just agreed to the mid bass bump. Thank you.

 

[ra990]

The bump in 'distortion' in that region is not distortion, but rather the room resonance if ur talking about speakers in a room.

If your talking about the Stealth, the bump is there to counter the lower distortion performance of the Stealth in area, leading to unfamiliarity. So the bump is a counter move to the lack of distortion, not distortion itself.



So the bump actually shows in the FR plot and not in the distortion plot, if related to the Stealth.

If you are talking speakers, then you just agreed to the mid bass bump. Thank you.

Yes, I had thought it showed on the frequency response but mixed it up with the distortion plot in my post. I didn't have them in front of me, but corrected now. Thank you. Other than that I'm pretty sure that we are saying the same thing about the bump on the Stealth but arguing over semantics. Please, let's put this to rest now.

Why don't you tell us about the music that you enjoy listening to? I don't think you have ever mentioned that in all your posts about being able to drive the Susvara and Stealth from the DAVE.

 

[duranxv]

I love the sound of the Stealth I just heard it at my customers house he just happen to be in to headphones. I listened to it on the Naim headphone server dac amp. Very surprised I enjoyed it. I must have one.

It's pretty much the only headphone I listen to now

 

[801evan]

Thank you. Other than that I'm pretty sure that we are saying the same thing about the bump on the Stealth but arguing over semantics. Please, let's put this to rest now.

I've explained the nuance here:

Well your statement is quite incomplete. A speaker 'flat' sound in a room or in an anechoic chamber? What's practical and accessible to find this statement relatable would be a speaker in room scenario and how someone claims it sounds flat. So now that statement will make people think a speaker that's flat sounding in a room will actually have a mid bass suck out and that's what Harman is trying to emulate as per Curra....and you.

Because what currawong said is open to misinterpretation because many people find the Yamaha ns-10 as a 'flat' sound in a room and may relate that with what Currawrong mentioned and form a conclusion on this "midbass suck out". But to say that the intention of Harman is to emulate that mid bass suck out makes it evident curra is wrong.

The whole controversial thing with Harman is around this area and where seemingly 'audiophiles' are dissing 'regular people' used in the test and just likes bass over refinement, conveniently dismissing the other chart showing the deviance in preference where some likes more bass and some like less bass. Dan mentioned in the video exactly this behavior where being acclimated to some TOTL HP listening that the Stealth can sound wrong or broken. While people may attribute it to subjectivity, it more of the power of interpretation and the ability to unlearn.

To wit, when I had a setup where it feels like there was too much lower mids for me on the Stealth, I was considering Crinacle's preference to follow the diffuse field target curve may be 'more correct'. So I had to imagine a Susvara sound with less resonance and group delay and such until such a HP is released...but then, by hook or by crook, that midbass is never gonna catch up and definitely is missing. But after a round of upgrades on the psu end, that mid bass and bass sounded more correct on the Stealth and has less emphasis and is now a very very balanced sound to my delight.

Why don't you tell us about the music that you enjoy listening to?

I did make a post about how Taylor Swift - Folklore sounds so good now.

However, my recent upgrades is starting to show the limited soundstage on the album, while other indie folk albums are much bigger like Polly Paulusma scissors in my pocket, and also Bjork- Post, Sleeper, Radiohead - Pablo Honey. I thought I extracted the most out of that Pablo Honey album months ago coz of the speed, dynamics and visceral nature of the output when it used to sound like a demo tape before. Even the vinyl release gave that demo tape kind of blacks. But on my last listen, the lower end just filled up a bit more. There seems to be a perceived loss ofd transparency coz of the filling up but the soundstage is much bigger so I think it has moved for the better.

Anyways, my music rotation has shrunk because I mostly try to listen to MQA if possible, but the library is small. The lower distortion of MQA, less ringing and expansion of soundstage can spoil a person to a point that MQA is very very rude in doing so. The recovery of harmonics is so good it's like tubes sans the distortion. Case in point, the saccharine pop duo M2M sounds so good on my setup that it will make one re-think their sentiments on the duo. Yes...I play what is typically annoying as a test and man, i shot myself on the foot coz they now sound so good.

 

[ra990]

Anyways, my music rotation has shrunk because I mostly try to listen to MQA if possible, but the library is small. The lower distortion of MQA, less ringing and expansion of soundstage can spoil a person to a point that MQA is very very rude in doing so. The recovery of harmonics is so good it's like tubes sans the distortion. Case in point, the saccharine pop duo M2M sounds so good on my setup that it will make one re-think their sentiments on the duo. Yes...I play what is typically annoying as a test and man, i shot myself on the foot coz they now sound so good.

So you only listen to mqa, but you use a DAVE, so how are you doing the full unfolding of the mqa? Software decoding? How is it that mqa sounds better to you than uncompressed pcm, like from Qobuz?

 

[BassicScience]

So you only listen to mqa, but you use a DAVE, so how are you doing the full unfolding of the mqa? Software decoding? How is it that mqa sounds better to you than uncompressed pcm, like from Qobuz?

Anything can sound better to anyone at any given time. The real question is how applying non-lossless processing to a master file results in "the lower distortion of MQA"?

 

[801evan]

So you only listen to mqa, but you use a DAVE, so how are you doing the full unfolding of the mqa? Software decoding? How is it that mqa sounds better to you than uncompressed pcm, like from Qobuz?

With Dave, zen stream does the first unfold. Unideal actually but it still sounds better than its 192/24 wav counterpart. Noticably less ringing. Better flow, timing and more intelligible. Better space perception and distance of where the drum is, it's size and quality of attack with my test on Astrud Gilberto album 'Parade' track.

 

[ra990]

With Dave, zen stream does the first unfold. Unideal actually but it still sounds better than its 192/24 wav counterpart. Noticably less ringing. Better flow, timing and more intelligible. Better space perception and distance of where the drum is, it's size and quality of attack with my test on Astrud Gilberto album 'Parade' track.

So you aren't even doing the full unfolding?

 

[801evan]

Anything can sound better to anyone at any given time. The real question is how applying non-lossless processing to a master file results in "the lower distortion of MQA"?

What you mentioned is acclimation and I can agree with that to a degree. But we are here in this forum to seek refinement yea?

With MQA and what not, if it sound better then it just is. I personally don't need to know the nuts and bolts on WHY it does to confirm and validate whatever. But at the same time I mention I understand , have experienced myself and don't deny what ppl hear and what I seemingly argue with ppl here. I've been where they are and I agree to what they are hearing. What I argue about is the interpretation and diagnosis of such...speaker amp argument for example.

Another example, the best sound out of the Hugo 1 is actually BT. It's the most linear and black sound. Despite it's 4:1 compression, it was the most glorious sound for me. Enough so that I had a miserable time upgrading the Hugo 2 for two years coz something was off. Even the BT wasn't as good. Turns out I had to use the toslink input with a good transport.

 

[801evan]

So you aren't even doing the full unfolding?

Nope. And it's still the best sound for me..second is Hi-Res wav (with HF on). HQplayer and pggb from 192/24 wav or 44.1 wav is off-timbre, flat and artificially wide and not recommended. HMS falls behind 44.1 CDT playback because of the inherent noise in the device and line in the output since my CDT has an advantage with the multi stage filtering and has an OCXO.

 

[Jimthecoffeeguy]

Another example, the best sound out of the Hugo 1 is actually BT. It's the most linear and black sound. Despite it's 4:1 compression, it was the most glorious sound for me. Enough so that I had a miserable time upgrading the Hugo 2 for two years coz something was off. Even the BT wasn't as good. Turns out I had to use the toslink input with a good transport.