[arnyk]

 
Sorry but that's rubbish.

That's not a well-reasoned answer. Sounds like dogma to me.

 

[bfreedma]

 
Sorry but that's rubbish.

 
Actually, it's accurate.  But if you disagree, you're going to need to reply with a much more detailed explanation of why.
 
Based on your responses to date, I have my doubts that's going to happen.

 

[cjl]

   
However I am correct in what I said. As after all not all DACs have the same clocks and components.

True. However, if the DAC has such a bad set of components and clocking capability that it could audibly affect timing, it would almost definitely not even function as a DAC. The clock requirements for a DAC to function at all are much, much stricter than the timing requirements to be below the threshold of audible perception.

 

[maverickronin]

  There's absolutely no chance that any DAC that functions at all could possibly change the timing of the actual music in a perceptible way.

  Sorry but that's rubbish.

 
Well, depends on your definition of "functions"...
 
It could just run it's clock at some arbitrary frequency other than the sample rate.  That will sure change things.  Unless you rockbox it the Clip+/Zip run 44.1khz file at something like a 1% different frequency to save a miniscule amount of battery life.  I was able to ABX some recorded samples someone posted on anything but ipod several years ago.
 
To be noticeable without a fast switch ABX to anyone without perfect pitch the DAC's clock is going to consistently have to be off a much larger margin or it's 'jitter' will need to be so high that it turns into wow and flutter...

 

[interpolate]

The problem is unless you work really close with the technology there is lots of information you won't know. Many manufacturers publish all of the technical specifications or at least the one's that count on their website. It's almost like a SDK for hardware manufacturers when it comes to the white papers with technical breakdowns, schematics and flow chart implementations.  Actually fully comprehending all of the principles of the documents is another thing.
 
On a personal level, I don't claim to understand or know about everything I read. Not everything is always that relevant like unboxing videos on Youtube they serve no real purpose other than to show a real product compared to copy products (I suppose now that I think about it).
 
At the moment, I am outputting from the line-out mode on my Fiio X3ii into my Denon system. Is there any latency? Probably however not enough to worry Einstein or Farraday.

 

[nick_charles]

One simple thing I would like to add.
 
While there is a large variability in the amplitude /frequency of jitter as has been mentioned, and while some DACs are less jitter-prone than others to date as far as I am aware (and I have trawled the AES library a lot) , there have been no properly controlled listening tests conducted anywhere in the world that have indicated that any type of jitter is audibly detectable at the levels typically found in even half-arsed digital kit.
 
In order to get a verifiably detectable jitter result the few researchers such as Ashihara and Benjamin & Gannon who have attempted it have been forced to inject jitter at utterly absurd levels.
 
A good but not by any means expensive DAC will have jitter distortion products that are at least 100db down on the fundamental in normal use, a good DAC will have jitter products at least 120db down. Not only are the sidebands small but the skirts are also small suggesting a low probability of detection. 
 
For instance here is the jitter measurements of 1995 DIY DAC and boy are they relatively bad !
 

 
Surely this is completely unlistenable !, well not according to Robert Harley who with some caveats opined 
 
 

  ...I think it's a killer unit—one that performs far, far better than its $449 price tag would indicate. The DAC-1 acquitted itself well in every circumstance...
it allowed rhythmic drive and a sense of the melodic line to pass through remarkably uncompromised. ..and in at least one area it's hard to beat...
...I still preferred the sweetness of the Assemblage unit overall...I definitely consider the DAC-1 to be a fine D/A
In its strengths, it offers competition to all comers...the pace, the progression of note to note in the music, was magnificent...The DAC-1 captured this in a way that many of the other units I 
compared it to didn't. It also revealed the extremely low-level details that are so wonderfully present on this disc: the inner voicings of the woodwind choirs; the different overtones of the 
ride and hi-hat cymbals; and the distinctive hall-acoustic of the recording venue, Concert Hall. I felt that the DAC-1 did a remarkable job of giving "body" to the notes, letting them grow out of 
the resonance of the instruments—a separate phenomenon from the bow's excitation of the string itself...The Assemblage got the details right: the ringing of the strings, the articulation of the 
cascading runs of notes, the bite of pick against heavy-gauge string. All of that was expected and present. What was far more important was the DAC-1's ability to portray all of the truly subtle 
signifiers—the microtonal inflections and phrasings that designate "country," "blues," and "rock." The Assemblage rendered each of them distinctly, neither confusing the issue nor further blurring 
the boundaries. Yet, at the same time, it refused to make them more distinct than they are...what ultimately impressed me most about the Assemblage DAC-1: that when confronted with extremely 
subtle distinctions, it conveyed them in ways that had real meaning for me. ...when you add up its virtues, you end up with a long list.

 
here by contrast is a 2014 $300 DAC on the same test
 

 

[arnyk]

Here is the jitter in a 1983 DAC in one of the first two CD players ever sold to the public - a CDP 101:
 

 

[arnyk]

   
In order to get a verifiably detectable jitter result the few researchers such as Ashihara and Benjamin & Gannon who have attempted it have been forced to inject jitter at utterly absurd levels.

 
I believe that some of the absurdly high levels that Benjamin and Gannon injected were on the order of the DAC that Harley tested.

 

[nick_charles]

   
I believe that some of the absurdly high levels that Benjamin and Gannon injected were on the order of the DAC that Harley tested.

 
Yes and no, the jitter B&G used ranged from a few ns sinewave jitter at 17000Hz to several 100s of ns. The single digit to just into double-digit ns of jitter were detected sometimes when using a single 11 Khz tone as the listening material. When they used actual music as the listening signal the jitter had to be substantially higher to be detected iirc the lowest amount detected was 26ns and that was for 1 subject the others did not detect anything below 35 ns and some did not detect it with some material until it was above 100ns...

 

[arnyk]

   
Yes and no, the jitter B&G used ranged from a few ns sinewave jitter at 17000Hz to several 100s of ns. The single digit to just into double-digit ns of jitter were detected sometimes when using a single 11 Khz tone as the listening material. When they used actual music as the listening signal the jitter had to be substantially higher to be detected iirc the lowest amount detected was 26ns and that was for 1 subject the others did not detect anything below 35 ns and some did not detect it with some material until it was above 100ns...

 
The period of a 17 KHz sine wave is 58 microseconds. (58E-06) seconds. or 58,000 nSec,  1 nSec of jitter (1E-09) seconds will vary its period from 57,999 to 58,001 nSec or from 17241.676  to 17241.082 Hz.  The frequency deviation is is about 0.6 Hz.  The modulation index is 0.6 Hz/ 17,000 Hz or 35 E-06. This is clearly narrow band FM modulation, so the most significant pair of sidebands will be at the modulating frequency (as yet unspecified) and their amplitude will be about 89 dB below that of the carrier. Harley's FFT seems to show the largest pair of sidebands at 76 dB down which is about 13 dB higher than 1 nSec or about 3 nSec.  The sidebands start @ about 250 Hz from the carrier and repeat at that frequency interval. Harley's jitter modulation frequency can be estimated at 250 hz. 
 
Really high jitter is rare in audio gear with any pretentions to quality and very difficult or impossible to hear which B&G's results seem to substantiate. Almost all  FFT's from modern gear will show sidebands that are 100 dB down or better which we see in both of the other FFTs. 

 

[GreenBow]

I came across a couple of pages.
 
This one has me pondering over the conclusion, as after all the science there is no conclusive audible statement.
http://www.madronadigital.com/Library/DigitalAudioJitter.html
 
This one categorically rules out any changes in signals over cheap and expensive cables.
http://archimago.blogspot.ca/2013/04/measurements-usb-cables-for-dacs.html
 
I am still undecided as to whether I can hear any change between a cheap cable and this audio quality cable. Sometimes I think it makes the sound very slightly more, involving, transparent, and better placed in the soundstage. However it's so hard to tell. That's the issue really. Is it £38 worth of improvement? Sometimes I think there is a marginal improvement which I like. It makes me want to keep it. Overall though it's so unclear. It's quite a financial investment in something that is not possible to be concrete about. Whereas the same money held in your wallet will absolutely redeem better sound, if spent on other upgrades.
 
Apparently this topic causes trouble in every forum. However I think it's worth debating because someone may come up with the definitive paper on it. To be rational, were there one, I am sure it would be quoted all day and every day.
 
This was an interesting read. Chord claimed their cable improved sound in an advert. However they were forced to retract the advert.
https://www.asa.org.uk/Rulings/Adjudications/2014/11/The-Chord-Company-Ltd/SHP_ADJ_274211.aspx#.Va5iax3bKUl

 

[arnyk]

  I came across a couple of pages.
 
This one has me pondering over the conclusion, as after all the science there is no conclusive audible statement.
http://www.madronadigital.com/Library/DigitalAudioJitter.html
 

 
I know the author of that paper well, and have publicly corrected his many technical errors and misapprehesions, primarily on the AVS forums.
 
This article has many failings rooted in the author's bases. For example, while he says that "Digital is not always digital", but does not say that analog is not always analog. In fact the results of the processing by the human ear is a stream of synapse firings that are themselves fully quantized.  
 
One of the more interesting experiences I had with him was a DBT wherein he was challenged to prove his ability to hear jitter. The results were well within the performance of even the most inexpensive digital gear.

 

[GreenBow]

He stated at one point that DACs don't re-clock, whereas we know modern quality ones do. Don't quote me on this, but after watching a youtube vid on the Chord Hugo I was astonished. It was claiming that part of the reason for the Hugo's awesome sound was error correction. Apparently the processors in the Hugo check the data in the stream thousands of times. Anyway the bottom line is, he should have amended that paper.
 
The last paragraphs are the ones that don't sit right. Where he claimed that someone asked him if the jitter was audible, and made no definitive reply.
 
Anyway more on this line of thought. I edited my last post with a page from the ASA. Chord could not present evidence of their claims on this subject.

 

[nick_charles]

   
 
One of the more interesting experiences I had with him was a DBT wherein he was challenged to prove his ability to hear jitter. The results were well within the performance of even the most inexpensive digital gear.

 
 
Link ?

 

[Speedskater]

The author of that paper seems to be maturing.  Some of his recent forum posts seem to be more reality based than his past efforts.