[hciman77]

...

 

[bigshot]

Quote:

Originally Posted by IPodPJ /img/forum/go_quote.gif I can't say conlusively what the reason is for the sonic differences that I can hear, but I know it isn't placebo. I'm not an engineer so I can only deduce what might be causing it.

"Deduce" is not a synonym for "guess". You've gotten your answer twenty times in this thread already.

See ya
Steve

 

[manaox2]

Quote:

Originally Posted by hciman77 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Probably not since the audio stream will be buffered before output. There is only one place that jitter matters and that is at the DAC, the DAC has a word buffer and does not process a word until it is full, thus variations in bit-timings are averaged out. So far nobody, and I do mean nobody, has found jitter at the levels found in commercial audio products to be ***reliably*** detectable. The poster child for bad jitter is the Oppo HD970 which clocks a massive 4ns of random jitter. However no rigorous test of jitter has found it to be audible below 20ns in music for deterministic jitter (Jitter correlated with the signal giving definite sidebands) or several 100s of ns for random jitter (jitter spread over the spectrum). Jitter just isnt worth worrying about.

Thanks, thats what I'd always thought. I keep finding people complaining about it and why this DAC is better then the next for a jitter reason, so I wanted an opinion.

So I can't see why the same exact data could be played on the same transport and system in a close time period and sound noticeably different. Especially because of a process that your computer has previously performed such as decompression.

 

[Febs]

Quote:

Originally Posted by IPodPJ /img/forum/go_quote.gif You showed that the waveforms were identical, so obviously we can rule that factor out.

I agree. We've ruled out the different waveforms. So why do you keep insisting that there is a difference in playback of one of those waveforms compared to the other?

Quote:

Quantum physicists don't even fully understand the nature of electrons (as they have observed single electrons in multiple places at once), so surely you aren't going to tell me that what flows from one end of your system to the other is going to be identical every single time just because a file is called "bit-perfect".

You aren't claiming that the same file is audibly different if played back multiple times. You are claiming that there is a consistent, reproducible, audible difference between two files that contain the same waveform.

Quote:

I can't say conlusively what the reason is for the sonic differences that I can hear, but I know it isn't placebo.

No. This is precisely my point. You don't know that. We have eliminated every other reasonably likely cause of audible differences between these files. Placebo is the most likely explanation for your claims. Until you conclusively eliminate placebo as a potential cause of whatever differences you think you hear, it is pointless to look for additional explanations, especially when those explanations are nothing but abject speculation.

 

[xenithon]

Right, so lets say you are pedantic such that you want to neither use iTunes (Mac) or Max to rip - you want to rip with EAC, but still want ALAC files to use on your Mac. Is there an ALAC encoder for EAC?

Also one question about iTunes (Max/Windows) - I was always under the impression that you should never use its volume control as anything less than 100% will not be "bitperfect" output. However, in that article on the Benchmark Media site, it says that volume control is very high quality and you should not be weary of using it all all. What is the verdict then about iTunes volume control?

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenithon /img/forum/go_quote.gif Is there an ALAC encoder for EAC?

Have you given iTunesEncode a try?
iTunesEncode.exe: Use EAC or Foobar to make Apple Lossless Files - SH Forums

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenithon /img/forum/go_quote.gif What is the verdict then about iTunes volume control?

99.99999% volume level is NOT lossless.
But it don't mean that there need to be any audible difference, just because its lossy.

 

[Manny Calavera]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elephas /img/forum/go_quote.gif I've never had any problems ripping ALAC with iTunes, Error Correction On, with a Plextor or Pioneer drives on WinXP or Vista, and also a MacBook/Mac OS X. I've done various comparisons with iTunes, EAC, dBpoweramp and foobar and am satisfied that iTunes ALAC rips sound equivalent to FLAC and WAV rips. There's no way I'm using WAV, no tagging. This thread was a waste of time, obviously there was a hardware issue or "user error," or both.

Agreed.Itunes is just great,if used properly.Some have issues using software though,and or,have deep seated misconceptions over things for no good reason at all.


Quote:

Originally Posted by n4k33n /img/forum/go_quote.gif Is this what happens when 50 year old audiophiles finally buy computers?

Seems to be the case,well,that and a few other things miced in for good measure !

Quote:

Originally Posted by IPodPJ /img/forum/go_quote.gif FYI, do you know Microsoft purposely inflates their software size to take up more hard drive space? They do this so that inexperienced people will keep having to upgrade their hardware, which usually means a new computer, which also means another sale for Microsoft. Several open source teams analyzed the code for Microsoft Office and found that it was 40 times larger than it needed to be.

Paranoid much ? Maybe try taking off the tin foil hat ? This seems to be a case of PEBKAC with a very,very heavy dose of placebo effect.

 

[Skylab]

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenithon /img/forum/go_quote.gif Right, so lets say you are pedantic such that you want to neither use iTunes (Mac) or Max to rip - you want to rip with EAC, but still want ALAC files to use on your Mac. Is there an ALAC encoder for EAC?

One cal always rip with EAC and then use dbpoweramp to convert from WAV to ALAC.

By the way, I tested iTunes CD rips to ALAC to ensure they were really lossless back when I first started using iTunes in late 2004. The rips are 100% identical to the original CD data, in that the ALAC files preserve the HDCD subcode that is buried in the Least Significant Bit of the 16-bit data. Only a bit-identical rip would allow this.

 

[nick_charles]

Quote:

FYI, do you know Microsoft purposely inflates their software size to take up more hard drive space? They do this so that inexperienced people will keep having to upgrade their hardware, which usually means a new computer, which also means another sale for Microsoft. Several open source teams analyzed the code for Microsoft Office and found that it was 40 times larger than it needed to be.

Quote:

Paranoid much ? Maybe try taking off the tin foil hat ? This seems to be a case of PEBKAC with a very,very heavy dose of placebo effect.

The story I heard back in the late 1990s was that Microsoft developers when they altered applications didnt do a clean rewrite but hacked around any existing code on the basis that maybe someone would ask for it back, thus you get an ever-expanding application with a load of unaccessible code. I have no way of knowing if this is true, but I tend to subscribe to the ****-up rather than conspiracy theory.

 

[terriblepaulz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by IPodPJ /img/forum/go_quote.gif If timing errors and jitter don't contribute to audio differences, why do people choose I2S over SPDIF if they are both bit-perfect? Why do people buy products from companies like Empirical Audio that re-clock? Why do people buy digital or analog RCA cables that yield different sonic flavors?

Because a fool and his money are easily separated.

 

[bhd812]

I read this entire thread and all i got from it was this reply....



What?

 

[bigshot]

This thread does not give accurate audio data.

See ya
Steve

 

[soundfreq]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif This thread does not give accurate audio data. See ya Steve

lol

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif This thread does not give accurate audio data.

Well said!

 

[Audiofiler]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif This thread does not give accurate audio data.

agree,