- Thread Starter
- #781
Thanks. Let's see how many in PS Audio forum vote for the red as their preferred, better sound.Just a visual comparison, plotted to scale:
View attachment 34614
Thanks. Let's see how many in PS Audio forum vote for the red as their preferred, better sound.Just a visual comparison, plotted to scale:
View attachment 34614
Thanks. Let's see how many in PS Audio forum vote for the red as their preferred, better sound.
Thanks !
These guys like Ted trust their ears don't they? hehehehehe.
You want real comedy, when you use Pkane's excellent Deltawave software, you get to add gain to a signal until you hear it. So in those charts he plots you can listen to the files with about 85 db of gain. One you hear a pretty clean 1 khz tone with just a bit of noise mixed in sort of like tape hiss. In one you hear substantial noise, with some hum, and if you keep listening very closely there are hints of the tone in there from time to time. To defend the noisy one vs the clean one is comically ridiculous. Someone with access to the other forum need to post these two files with the boost already in and let people listen to them.
It’s not XOR right? So could he any combination.Incompetence, arrogance, or criminality? Which to choose from?
I think it would be easy to prove the ASR methodology wrong. Somebody just has to make a DAC that passes all of the ASR tests at a good or great level but that also obviously sounds bad and doesn't recreate the music successfully.
1. My point is basically what you said. Sound = measurements, more or less.That’s certainly impossible to achieve (as measurements are relevant) and I trust capable designers have something else to do.
Point is more if there is a one on one relationship between exceptional measures (resp. poor) with the perceived quality of the sound.
Sometimes, I cannot find that relationship to be aligned with my own experience / ears.
ASR allowed me to discover superb DAC’s I may have ignored otherwise. I bought them, listen to them and I like them very much: Sabaj D5, E1DA.
Some products have very good measurements, but I have technical issues with them (Topping NX4).
There are some products with superb measurements, which I like very much, who are regularly suffering from negative comments because of what the designer says (Chord). Some others are considered as fantastic because of measures, functions and rigor of the designer (RME). I have a Chord Hugo2 and a RME ADI2. Even after having read all comments in the forum, I still enjoy more H2 + Rupert Neve Amp versus RME ADI2 when used with headphones. Impossible to hear any difference when I focus on it, but when I listen I have just more fun with one of the 2.
I am owning a TotalDAC. Whatever measures, strange behavior of the designer and horrible comments here, I am not complaining with the sound. With ASR I discovered the Matrix Element X. Fantastic! (Not so much the app nor the configuration process. But works perfectly with Roon). They are now on my main music system and I am spending more and more time with the Element X. I cannot say however that thanks to its fabulous measurements I am rediscovering my records vs TotalDAC.
Finally, during the past years I have regularly listened to PS Audio DAC and I almost always didn’t like what I’ve heard. So some years back, the choice for TotalDAC. Thanks to ASR, I may now understand why I was missing something when listening to PS Audio.
But it also means that negative measures don't imply the same when it comes to sound. At least in my personal experience.
But it also means that negative measures don't imply the same when it comes to sound.
We're largely immune to hearing distortion up to a point - perhaps you never reached that point...
I think Rupert Neve never made a secret of the fact he liked to have an amp adding some harmonics, which adds some "body" to the sound.I still enjoy more H2 + Rupert Neve Amp versus RME ADI2
2. You buy way too many DACs for someone not running a review site. Seek professional help.
But it doesn't look like this DAC's issue is it's DSP.
RME ADI-2 Pro's the normal and AE versions running in DSD Direct mode at DSD256 (massively more accurate than with PCM input).
It will never happen, but some of us have been honored by having screenshots of our posts featured on the PS Audio Forum:
https://forum.psaudio.com/t/another-review-of-the-ds-dac/13027/357
While flattered by the attention, I think they missed my best satirical pieces.
Would be great if @amirm could test this with RME ADI-2 FS.
I think it would be easy to prove the ASR methodology wrong. Somebody just has to make a DAC that passes all of the ASR tests at a good or great level but that also obviously sounds bad and doesn't recreate the music successfully.