[KeithEmo]

No.... the problem is that a lot of people don't seem to understand how you calculate whether a given characteristic is important in a particular design or not.
Combining things is fine... as long as you remember that there are several factors involved and calculate them separately where appropriate.

For example, in a typical power supply, a standard electrolytic capacitor will work fine.
This is because the capacitor isn't being asked to conduct high levels of current (not much ripple current; and what there is at a relatively low frequency).
Therefore, the amount of heat generated due to its ESR will not be significant.

However, if you use that same capacitor in a switching supply, it may well overheat.
This is because, in a switching supply, that capacitor is being asked to filter high ripple currents at high frequencies, which subjects it to higher losses from its equivalent series resistance.
Therefore, in that application, heating is an issue, and a low ESR electrolytic capacitor, or even a better type with much lower ESR, is indicated.

As it so happens, the construction of a typical electrostatic speaker results in a very low ESR, even at high frequencies, so it is NOT subject to heat from current flow at audio frequencies.

In other words, in order to understand what will happen, you have to load your model with appropriate values for the particular circuit you're discussing.
(For example, in a capacitor, you need to know how much ripple current it will be expected to conduct at the frequencies and voltages it will be operating at.)

I understand your confusion. The DC property of resistance as well as AC property of reactance is in the circuit. I get it, you are not used to people combining the findings of both analysis.

 

[bigshot]

I think with two channels on a CD you should have two separate CD players playing separate CDs. I'll need six players for my 5.1 system.

 

[Yuurei]

I am confused about what has a real impact on the sound. I always thought that the real impact on the sound has a well-made album and headphones/speakers. I don't believe that cables have an impact on sound. But what about amplifiers or DACs? Every now and then I read about the AMP modules or DACs playing better than others (you know warmer sound, better bass response etc) and somehow it doesn't fit me. It seems to me that the task of the amplifier is to amplify the signal, and the task of the DAC is to convert the signal from digital to analog. Transparently. How does this look in real world?

 

[analogsurviver]

I am confused about what has a real impact on the sound. I always thought that the real impact on the sound has a well-made album and headphones/speakers. I don't believe that cables have an impact on sound. But what about amplifiers or DACs? Every now and then I read about the AMP modules or DACs playing better than others (you know warmer sound, better bass response etc) and somehow it doesn't fit me. It seems to me that the task of the amplifier is to amplify the signal, and the task of the DAC is to convert the signal from digital to analog. Transparently. How does this look in real world?

You can spend a lifetime on threads similar to this - or get an answer in about one hour to one weekend; depending how good your other gear is and how good recordings you are using for the comparison. The closest thing to answer to what are you asking would be direct comparison between iFi Micro DSD https://ifi-audio.com/portfolio-view/micro-idsd/ and iFi Micro iDSD Black Label https://ifi-audio.com/portfolio-view/micro-idsd-bl/ .

It puts to rest ANY doubt that the quality of electronic components does not matter - for good ...

And it would take one hell of a high quality measuring setup to get ANY meaningful measurement differences between the two.

 

[pinnahertz]

I am confused about what has a real impact on the sound. I always thought that the real impact on the sound has a well-made album and headphones/speakers. I don't believe that cables have an impact on sound. But what about amplifiers or DACs? Every now and then I read about the AMP modules or DACs playing better than others (you know warmer sound, better bass response etc) and somehow it doesn't fit me. It seems to me that the task of the amplifier is to amplify the signal, and the task of the DAC is to convert the signal from digital to analog. Transparently. How does this look in real world?

What you've just said is actually quite correct. The big impact on sound is in the transducer (microphones, speakers, headphones) and the environment they are in. The electronics has far less impact, though not zero.

Where you have to be extremely careful is how you do your comparisons. With transducers, the differences are measurably and audibly huge, but with electronics like amps and DACs, the differences are very small. And this is where expectation bias becomes the dominant factor. A simple and sighted A/B comparison can, and usually does, result in differences and preferences, but when the same devices are compared using a double-blind technique, which prevents the listener from knowing what he's listening to and is a test for difference only, not preference, the differences often vanish into statistical guessing. But, because performing an ABX/DBT on DACs, for example, is actually quite difficult to do, even impossible for the casual hobbyist, strong opinions surface that would not be present if expectation bias were under control. These opinions, when challenged, reduce to "I know what I hear!", when in fact, the opposite is actually true.

This does not mean that there are not differences in amplifiers and DACs that do not show up on an ABX/DBT, there are some, but they are remarkably few. The big challenge is getting good information that is not just emphatic opinion. I have no suggestions on that, except to recognize when those opinions are given and realize they have been derived from sighted and biased testing. It doesn't mean they are necessarily wrong, but sure increases the chances they are. Also look for opinions stated without proof of any kind. Those are pretty easy to spot, though sometimes the promise of future proof is as emphatic as the opinion, it never actually is provided.

 

[TheSonicTruth]

What you've just said is actually quite correct. The big impact on sound is in the transducer (microphones, speakers, headphones) and the environment they are in. The electronics has far less impact, though not zero.

Where you have to be extremely careful is how you do your comparisons. With transducers, the differences are measurably and audibly huge, but with electronics like amps and DACs, the differences are very small. And this is where expectation bias becomes the dominant factor. A simple and sighted A/B comparison can, and usually does, result in differences and preferences, but when the same devices are compared using a double-blind technique, which prevents the listener from knowing what he's listening to and is a test for difference only, not preference, the differences often vanish into statistical guessing. But, because performing an ABX/DBT on DACs, for example, is actually quite difficult to do, even impossible for the casual hobbyist, strong opinions surface that would not be present if expectation bias were under control. These opinions, when challenged, reduce to "I know what I hear!", when in fact, the opposite is actually true.

This does not mean that there are not differences in amplifiers and DACs that do not show up on an ABX/DBT, there are some, but they are remarkably few. The big challenge is getting good information that is not just emphatic opinion. I have no suggestions on that, except to recognize when those opinions are given and realize they have been derived from sighted and biased testing. It doesn't mean they are necessarily wrong, but sure increases the chances they are. Also look for opinions stated without proof of any kind. Those are pretty easy to spot, though sometimes the promise of future proof is as emphatic as the opinion, it never actually is provided.

"What you've just said is actually quite correct.
The big impact on sound is in the transducer
(microphones, speakers, headphones) and the
environment they are in. The electronics has far
less impact, though not zero."

Even bigger than the transducers: The content(Composition, performance, recording, mixing, and mastering). Now somebody tell me I'm "wrong"!

 

[Yuurei]

What you've just said is actually quite correct. The big impact on sound is in the transducer (microphones, speakers, headphones) and the environment they are in. The electronics has far less impact, though not zero.

Got it, thank you very much

 

[pinnahertz]

"What you've just said is actually quite correct.
The big impact on sound is in the transducer
(microphones, speakers, headphones) and the
environment they are in. The electronics has far
less impact, though not zero."

Even bigger than the transducers: The content(Composition, performance, recording, mixing, and mastering). Now somebody tell me I'm "wrong"!

Ok, “you’re (a bit) wrong. While “garbage in/garbage out” is true, with transducers you can easily have “no garbage in/garbage out”...on everything played through it.

 

[TheSonicTruth]

Ok, “you’re (a bit) wrong. While “garbage in/garbage out” is true, with transducers you can easily have “no garbage in/garbage out”...on everything played through it.

And this is the mentality today that leads to dynamically squashed, shallow, lifeless CR.A.P. Today's converters, both going in and out, smoke those of even twenty years ago, let alone thirty. Storage is a steal, and production goes on at mind-boggling bit depths and sampling rates. We have the opportunity to create songs and albums that blow away anything created twenty, thirty, forty years ago. Yet the stuff being turned out gives me a splitting headache to listen to for more than a half hour.

Something that is great, with no clipping or other distortion in it, intentional or non, will sound great no matter what(a cheap boombox or full-sized home rig) it is heard back on. Even with twenty year old ADCs in production.

 

[KeithEmo]

I would suggest that there are two very different schools of thought on your question....

The one that I, and most people on this thread, subscribe to is that DACs and amplifiers should do their best to simply reproduce whatever you feed into them as transparently as possible. There is only one theoretically perfect way of reproducing an audio signal - and everyone's goal should be to get as close to it as possible. Most modern amplifiers and DACs do at least a pretty good job of achieving this goal, although nothing is perfect, and you'll find a wide variety of opinions about how well many actually succeed. Some people will insist that "all DACs sound pretty much the same" or "all properly designed amplifiers sound about the same" - while many notice tiny differences and find them important. However, there is a basic agreement that they all should sound the same, and any differences that might be audible are simply flaws. The original definition of how a high fidelity amplifier should sound was "like a straight piece of wire - with gain".

However, you will also find many audiophiles who believe that various pieces of equipment not only sound audibly different, but consider this to be a virtue - because it gives them a lot of different options to choose from. They will insist that all human experience is subjective so "all that matters is that you like the way your system sounds". You will also find that many equipment manufacturers, and especially many so-called "boutique high end audiophile equipment manufacturers", DELIBERATELY design their equipment to have some sort of distinct sonic signature that they believe will make it attractive to a certain audience. These are the ones who, rather than design their equipment to sound neutral, design it to have "a warm sound" or "tube sound"... or whatever they believe will appeal to the market segment they hope to attract.

(As a broad generality, these days it should be possible to design an amplifier or DAC that sounds quite close to neutral, unless you're either not a competent designer, or you deliberately set out not to.)

And, of course, there is a huge grey area between intentional differences, unintentional differences, and differences that are so small that they may exist only in the imagination of the listener.

I should add that the single audio component that varies the most, both because it is difficult to design one that is perfectly neutral, and because there are various ideas abut how it should interact with the environment, are transducers. Different speakers interact differently with different rooms, and there is no clear definition about some of the details - for example, whether a speaker with a narrow dispersion is more accurate than one with an omnidirectional response. Likewise, headphones vary significantly in sound, may interact differently with the head and ear shapes of different users, and are imperfect enough that some users may simply prefer the compromises made by one over the compromises made by another... and this opens the door of interactions with other equipment. (For example, a certain listener may enjoy the high frequency response of a given model enough that they're willing to accept its relatively poor low frequency response. They may then end up looking for a headphone amplifier that exaggerates the low frequencies - to compensate for that flaw in the headphones that they otherwise like. Since nobody makes one that is perfect in all respects, and most that are even close are quite expensive, the door is opened to each listener choosing which compromises they consider most important.)

I am confused about what has a real impact on the sound. I always thought that the real impact on the sound has a well-made album and headphones/speakers. I don't believe that cables have an impact on sound. But what about amplifiers or DACs? Every now and then I read about the AMP modules or DACs playing better than others (you know warmer sound, better bass response etc) and somehow it doesn't fit me. It seems to me that the task of the amplifier is to amplify the signal, and the task of the DAC is to convert the signal from digital to analog. Transparently. How does this look in real world?

 

[bigshot]

I don't believe that cables have an impact on sound. But what about amplifiers or DACs? Every now and then I read about the AMP modules or DACs playing better than others (you know warmer sound, better bass response etc) and somehow it doesn't fit me. It seems to me that the task of the amplifier is to amplify the signal, and the task of the DAC is to convert the signal from digital to analog. Transparently. How does this look in real world?

The answer to your question is easy to find. Audible transparency requires tests with human ears to determine for sure. Measurements can give you enough for a well educated guess, but actually doing a line level matched, direct switchable blind comparison is the best way to find out for yourself. It isn't hard to do. I've done it with every amp and player and DAC I've owned and they are all totally transparent to my ears. That's good enough for me. Most of the people who talk about night and day differences between DACs and amps have never done a controlled comparison themselves. They allow bias to color their judgements, or they double down on overkill "just to be on the safe side". I don't listen to them very carefully when they make claims about audibility.

When I shop for amps, I look at the power specs and the features. When I look for players and DACs, I pay attention to the features and ease of use. I don't bother looking at the response, noise or distortion levels. I expect those to be below the threshold of audibility. If they aren't my comparison test will reveal that and I'll return them as defective. In the past couple of decades, I haven't had to do that yet.

 

[Yuurei]

Most of the people who talk about night and day differences between DACs and amps have never done a controlled comparison themselves. They allow bias to color their judgements, or they double down on overkill "just to be on the safe side".

Sounds exactly like one of my friends. I learn not to disscus with him any equipment related issues, because he gets angry very easily

 

[71 dB]

I am confused about what has a real impact on the sound.

Everything has an impact on sound, but on very different levels. The scale is huge. The order from most impact to least impact goes like this:

- room acoustics / speaker and listening point placement / crossfeed / quality of production (HUGE impact)
- speakers / headphones / tube amplifiers (significant impact)
- sound source quality (includes DAC) (small impact)
- transistor amplifiers / speaker cables* (hardly noticable impact)
- line level signal analog cables (below human threshold, placebo)
- headphones cables. (below human threshold, placebo)

So that's the principle you should use to weight how to spend your money in order to get most bang for the buck. Buying a $100 carpet on the floor to improve the acoustics can have as much positive impact to the speaker sound than buying $1000 more expensive speakers.

* speaker cables need to be adequate electrically, but it's this is cheap to achieve.

 

[TheSonicTruth]

Everything has an impact on sound, but on very different levels. The scale is huge. The order from most impact to least impact goes like this:

- room acoustics / speaker and listening point placement / crossfeed / quality of production (HUGE impact)
- speakers / headphones / tube amplifiers (significant impact)
- sound source quality (includes DAC) (small impact)
- transistor amplifiers / speaker cables* (hardly noticable impact)
- line level signal analog cables (below human threshold, placebo)
- headphones cables. (below human threshold, placebo)
- musical composition(arrangement, lyrics)
- production choices(leaving music open and dynamic, vs EQing and squashing the schit out of it!)


So that's the principle you should use to weight how to spend your money in order to get most bang for the buck. Buying a $100 carpet on the floor to improve the acoustics can have as much positive impact to the speaker sound than buying $1000 more expensive speakers.

* speaker cables need to be adequate electrically, but it's this is cheap to achieve.

Please note edits, ^above^.

 

[bigshot]

Sounds exactly like one of my friends. I learn not to disscus with him any equipment related issues, because he gets angry very easily

I don't get angry. I expect people to be able to back up what they say with evidence though. If someone insists on saying stupid stuff and can't back it up, I just disregard them. My disregard list isn't long. You have to really be delusional to get onto it.

- sound source quality (includes DAC) (small impact)
- transistor amplifiers / speaker cables* (hardly noticable impact)

I'm looking for specific examples of current DACs and solid state amps that sound different (not because of a design or manufacturing flaw or using them for purposes they weren't designed for). If you know of any, please let me know. I've compared dozens of these sorts of things and they are all audibly transparent... and you can't improve upon transparent.