[scompton]

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Howdy,
 

You have an interesting opinion regarding how these differences in sound among DACs could be explained.  While I respect your opinion and your right to express it here or anywhere else, head-fi.org seems like a weird choice of fora to express it so strongly.  It's like logging into a Wine Aficionados' forum and posting about how the chemical properties of wine are no different at 45 degrees then they are at 65 degrees, therefore it's scientifically impossible for serving temperature to affect taste.  There are better analogies; someone help me out here!  LOL.

That's a perfect analogy because you'd want to serve the wines at the exact same temperature, just like the line levels should be matched for any listening test.  If levels aren't matched, whichever is louder is going to be judged better in nearly 100% of the cases.

 

[RonaldDumsfeld]

Something to note about this product which marks it out from most, if not all, competitors at the price:-
 
The EM-U 0204, like the 0202 which came before, comes complete with a 1/8" microphone input which is capable of supplying 5V phantom power suitable for driving an electret condenser microphone i.e one used on a headset or mobile phone.
 
This can be remarkably handy and I miss it on other supposedly better products. I've never been able to find anything that either adapts a 48V phantom power supply (suitable for studio condenser mics) to 5V or delivers 5V in some other way, perhaps from a battery. If anyone reading knows of such a device I'd be pleased to hear from them.
 
 
 

 

[EddieE]

[size=x-small]What really gets me is why anyone wants DACs and amps to sound different?[/size]
 
[size=x-small]How does that benefit the consumer? [/size]
 
[size=x-small]We have all the choice in the world as to how our transucers sound and if you get in to speakers a whole mine field of room acosutics to deal with, in adition we have equalisers, sound filters and so on - there is every option for how our music sounds in the area it is supposed to be.[/size]
 
[size=x-small]A DAC has a specific job - to create a clean, accurate lineout signal from a digital source. An amp has a specific job - to amplify it to power transducers without audible distortion or noise. [/size]
 
[size=x-small]Both those tasks are, in the present day, perfectly acheivable with the technology we have.[/size]
 
[size=x-small]There is an upper roof when it comes to those specific tasks and one which I and others believe can be done for a lot less than many are paying.[/size]
 
[size=x-small]The culture of amp reviews reading like restaurants reviews comes from a time when amp manufacturers could not achieve that perfection and had to market their own version of imperfection as being a better sounding one than everyone elses.[/size]
 
[size=x-small]I can understand why manufacturers and hifi magazines want to carry that culture on (profit) but in reality amps sounding different was a problem, not a desired status quo, same with early DAC chips - they couldn't do their jobs properly and that "smooth audiophile sound" people who got early CD players loved was just a result of rolled off treble. It was never a desirable quality in an instrument whoes key job description is accuracy. If the consumer wants less treble - plenty of transducers can do that for them, or a good equaliser or sound filter.[/size]
 
[size=x-small]We now have obsolete DAC whichs which audibly roll of the treble being presented as the most sought after component in a system, tube amps which distort being bandied about as the zenith of audio joy - this puts the ball back where the manufacturers want it with everything being subjective again and everyone spending a bomb on buying amp after amp and dac after dac looking for perfection. I get why the manufacturers and broader industry want to keep hold of this, but why does the consumer?[/size]
 
[size=x-small]If the consumer stopped going for it, and got professional quality gear for a fraction of the price of "boutique audiophile" gear which did their jobs perfectly we'd all be a lot better off and be able to spend our money on headphones, speakers, acoustics and of course - MUSIC - what this is all about after all.[/size]

 

[Omega17TheTrue]

^ While i understand your point its like asking why people are so different between them-self, do you want a world made of clones with the same face, culture,beliefs,views,hearing,food and language ?

Imagine how the world would be dull with only one brand in the world making the exact same gear... and only one band playing music just to ensure it is truly authentic.

 

[dsnyder]

Hello,
 
Quote:

[size=x-small]What really gets me is why anyone wants DACs and amps to sound different?[/size]
[size=small]...[/size]
[size=x-small]A DAC has a specific job - to create a clean, accurate lineout signal from a digital source. An amp has a specific job - to amplify it to power transducers without audible distortion or noise. [/size]
 
[size=x-small]Both those tasks are, in the present day, perfectly acheivable with the technology we have.[/size]

 
Very good points, and I'm with you!  I sincerely wish that all DACs sounded exactly like the Weiss DAC 202.  It's annoying that they don't.  It's even more annoying that in a year or two Weiss or someone else will almost certainly produce a DAC that sounds even better while others will produce DACs that sound nearly as good for a fraction of its $6,700 price.
 
While I do believe that Grace Design, Weiss, dCS, Benchmark, Wyred 4 Sound, Empirical Audio and other DAC manufactures are in business to make money, I also believe that they are hoping to do this by designing and building what they honestly believe are the best sounding DAC's at their target price points.  Most of these guys are audiophiles and recordists themselves, and they aim to create products that they would want to own themselves.
 
While unscrupulous vendors exist in every industry, businesses that consistently provide customers with good service and good value for money tend to succeed in the long-term.  If there is actually no sonic difference between products like the Weiss DAC 2 (or Grace Design m903) and the E-MU 0204 USB, this secret won't stay a secret for very long.  I guess time will tell.  
 
-- David

 

[thuantran]

Omega I think you miss the point of EddieE, if you want a certain flavor you can apply certain DSP or different transducers. The problem is supposedly you could make perfectly transparent gears, it's not always the case that you could find a suitable DSP to create the sound you want. Personally I prefer EddieE's world as to me DACoversion is a mathematically process , but for cars, women, wine,... and similar stuffs, it's another matter...

 

[3X0]

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FWIW, 3X0 I value your analysis of the supposed differences between DACs from both your personal experience and a survey of the studies out there. And dsnyder, I think many "seasoned" members of Head-Fi might do well to learn from your reasoned preference to agree to disagree.
 
3X0, it's heartening to read that you consider expensive DACs an unwise investment for accuracy (or perhaps we might call it audio fidelity). In your opinion, the DAC in my M-Audio FireWire interface should be fine? As would the built-in DAC on a MacBook Pro?

Yes, the only question is whether they will drive your headphones to sufficient volume levels. Volume is the only audibly differentiable variable.
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That's a perfect analogy because you'd want to serve the wines at the exact same temperature, just like the line levels should be matched for any listening test.  If levels aren't matched, whichever is louder is going to be judged better in nearly 100% of the cases.

Yes.
Quote:

Originally Posted by EddieE /img/forum/go_quote.gif[size=small]Both those tasks are, in the present day, perfectly acheivable with the technology we have.[/size]
 
[size=x-small]I can understand why manufacturers and hifi magazines want to carry that culture on (profit) but in reality amps sounding different was a problem, not a desired status quo, same with early DAC chips - they couldn't do their jobs properly and that "smooth audiophile sound" people who got early CD players loved was just a result of rolled off treble. It was never a desirable quality in an instrument whoes key job description is accuracy. If the consumer wants less treble - plenty of transducers can do that for them, or a good equaliser or sound filter.[/size]
 
[size=x-small]We now have obsolete DAC whichs which audibly roll of the treble being presented as the most sought after component in a system, tube amps which distort being bandied about as the zenith of audio joy - this puts the ball back where the manufacturers want it with everything being subjective again and everyone spending a bomb on buying amp after amp and dac after dac looking for perfection. I get why the manufacturers and broader industry want to keep hold of this, but why does the consumer?[/size]
 
[size=x-small]If the consumer stopped going for it, and got professional quality gear for a fraction of the price of "boutique audiophile" gear which did their jobs perfectly we'd all be a lot better off and be able to spend our money on headphones, speakers, acoustics and of course - MUSIC - what this is all about after all.[/size]

Yes. My Nova actually has a filter on the back that, when set to "Soft", actually makes the unit less accurate (Peachtree straight-up admits that it makes the unit measure less well)! Yet audiophile magazines, publications, and sheep tend to follow that the soft filter sounds more pleasing. It's ridiculous.
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While unscrupulous vendors exist in every industry, businesses that consistently provide customers with good service and good value for money tend to succeed in the long-term.  If there is actually no sonic difference between products like the Weiss DAC 2 (or Grace Design m903) and the E-MU 0204 USB, this secret won't stay a secret for very long.  I guess time will tell.  

It's no secret. There's evidence, papers, documentation everywhere. People are just victims to marketing. "Audiophile" publications nowadays need to market vendor products to make money. Boutique shops selling "high-end" electronics have been closing steadily. It's not an industry with a great deal of growth potential, so there's a lot of bollocks being thrown around by fairly untalented marketers that is eaten up by fairly gullible audiophiles that would do much better for there money (actually infinity better, since the denominator in the equation of sonic improvement would be 0) with a better set of headphones. For one thing, headphones actually legitimately measure differently, and these differences are actually audible.
 
It kills me that so many audiophiles possessed by the notion of differences in DACs (or any properly level-matched components) purely resort to strawman arguments.

 

[infinitesymphony]

I'd like to see the scientific studies that objectively demonstrated no differences between DACs with entirely different components. Listening tests are subjective and system-dependent.
 
"Level match and everything will sound the same" is like saying a pair of iPod earbuds can be EQ'd to sound exactly like Sennheiser HD650s. At some point, the performance of the components matters. DACs are all imperfectly trying to approximate the original signal; does that make them all "defective?" I suspect the response will be, "But listeners X, Y, and Z couldn't hear a difference!" Maybe they couldn't. Some people can and base their careers around it. Not everyone is equipped to be a mastering engineer, after all.

 

[3X0]

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"Level match and everything will sound the same" is like saying a pair of iPod earbuds can be EQ'd to sound exactly like Sennheiser HD650s.

Another strawman argument. No, these are two different things. Headphones absolutely sound different. You cannot EQ away the design (housing, damping, et alia) of the headphone housing nor the characteristics of the driver(s, crossover).

 

[infinitesymphony]

Headphones sound "entirely different" only because you yourself can hear the difference, right?

 

[3X0]

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Headphones sound "entirely different" only because you yourself can hear the difference, right?

No, because the differences are measurable. This isn't even a question of blind-testing anymore.
 
Strawman again?

 

[infinitesymphony]

The differences in DAC components (and their resulting outputs) are measurable. Take a quick look through the Benchmark DAC1 thread and you'll see the designer's justifications for the DAC's parts selection. How did he decide which parts to use? He measured them within the system using scientific equipment and chose the ones with the most accurate signal reproduction.
 
If both headphones and DACs have measurable differences, my argument is not a straw man, it's an analogy. I'll avoid using those in the future because you seem to be treating DACs as a special case.

 

[RonaldDumsfeld]

I understand X3O's position perfectly and cannot understand why you don't either.
 
A DAC (or an amp or a cable) differs from a transducer (speaker, microphone, earbud etc) in that it has a theoretical maximum 'sound quality'.
 
Clean. Transparent. You don't know it's there. To within the ability of the human auditory system to differentiate. Really expensive gear may look more impressive on paper. It might even make sense in a studio context where tracks may be bounced down many, many times. On final mastered material though - once you cannot hear the difference it's pointless going further. That can be done nowadays at a very reasonable cost. Very reasonable indeed.
 
I can understand the pride in ownership aspects of having a really high quality, well designed, built and supported product even if i know it's probably over engineered for the job in hand.
 
What's wrong is designing and marketing a DAC on the basis it 'sounds better' than the competition. It shouldn't 'sound better'. It should sound as if it isn't there at all. A DAC shouldn't have to function like an EQ or effect. If you really do want to modify the sound to suit personal taste, fashion, space or existing equipment there are much easier and cheaper ways to do that. 
 

 

[tlniec]

Another way to look at this, perhaps... communications equipment (i.e. radios) ROUTINELY perform ADC, DAC, and amplification functions on signals in the GHz frequencies.  We can get a transmitter to "talk to" a receiver (provided it's using the appropriate protocol/waveform and tuned to the appropriate frequency).  That receiver can reproduce the original signal bit-for-bit (e.g. in a datalink).  Granted, error-correction/re-transmission/etc may be involved, which you wouldn't typically see in audio equipment.  But still... why is it so hard to believe in transparent equipment at audio frequencies WAAAAAAAAAY down in the KHz, again?

 

[3X0]

Quote:

The differences in DAC components (and their resulting outputs) are measurable. Take a quick look through the Benchmark DAC1 thread and you'll see the designer's justifications for the DAC's parts selection. How did he decide which parts to use? He measured them within the system using scientific equipment and chose the ones with the most accurate signal reproduction.
 
If both headphones and DACs have measurable differences, my argument is not a straw man, it's an analogy. I'll avoid using those in the future because you seem to be treating DACs as a special case.

Marketing. The designer wants to sell you his product. He wants you to buy it, and many will insist you keep it for 90 days of "burn-in" so that your opportunity for credit card protection is gone.
 
Do you also believe in jitter, cables and power conditioning?
 


Quote:

What's wrong is designing and marketing a DAC on the basis it 'sounds better' than the competition. It shouldn't 'sound better'. It should sound as if it isn't there at all. A DAC shouldn't have to function like an EQ or effect. If you really do want to modify the sound to suit personal taste, fashion, space or existing equipment there are much easier and cheaper ways to do that. 

Absolutely. It is dirt cheap to produce a DAC that translates a digital signal completely faithfully. People need to stop drinking the kool-aid.