DuaneInHiding
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- Joined
- Jan 8, 2020
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I’ve been lurking and absorbing so much great information from this forum, but before I get carried away with making purchases based on an incomplete understanding I was hoping to ask some stupid questions (while showing my math) in the hopes that some of the generous people I’ve seen posting around here will set me straight.
For ease of argument, let’s say:
A. my listening area has a consistent ambient noise floor of 30 dB. (It’s very consistent, uniform and broadband…like a white/pink noise generator I play to help my cats sleep.)
B. I put on my open headphones (for sake of argument, so open that I’m hearing all 30 dB of the room around me along with the music) and adjust the volume so that the peaks are hitting my eardrums at 90 dB.
Question #1: Is it accurate to say that I will then be able to perceive 60 dB of dynamic range (correct term?) in my music — the distance between the loudest peaks and the point where the quietest parts are swallowed up by my room’s ambient noise?
Question #2: According to the review, a Topping D90 has a SINAD of about 120dB. (Don’t know if that’s the correct way to say that…) In the hypothetical situation spelled out in A and B above, would it be accurate to say that any noise introduced by the D90 would be 60dB below the ambient noise floor established by the combination of my listening environment and the playback volume of my music?
Question #2b: 60dB is a lot, right?!
Question #3: Let’s say I’m weird and I actually want to hear the noise introduced by a poorly-engineered DAC. Would I need to buy one so terrible that it has a SINAD of 59 dB before I could really hear its contributions to my music over my room’s ambient background noise?
Question #4: I decide to compare the Topping D90 to the off-brand CrappyDAC, which has a measured SINAD of 61 dB. Assuming my room only allows for 60 dB of range between the loudest peaks and the ambient noise, will the D90 effectively sound less noisy than the CrappyDAC? Or will they both perform well enough that their introduced noise will be masked below the ambient sound in the room to effectively the same degree?
Can anyone help shed some light on these questions?
Thanks in advance,
Duane
For ease of argument, let’s say:
A. my listening area has a consistent ambient noise floor of 30 dB. (It’s very consistent, uniform and broadband…like a white/pink noise generator I play to help my cats sleep.)
B. I put on my open headphones (for sake of argument, so open that I’m hearing all 30 dB of the room around me along with the music) and adjust the volume so that the peaks are hitting my eardrums at 90 dB.
Question #1: Is it accurate to say that I will then be able to perceive 60 dB of dynamic range (correct term?) in my music — the distance between the loudest peaks and the point where the quietest parts are swallowed up by my room’s ambient noise?
Question #2: According to the review, a Topping D90 has a SINAD of about 120dB. (Don’t know if that’s the correct way to say that…) In the hypothetical situation spelled out in A and B above, would it be accurate to say that any noise introduced by the D90 would be 60dB below the ambient noise floor established by the combination of my listening environment and the playback volume of my music?
Question #2b: 60dB is a lot, right?!
Question #3: Let’s say I’m weird and I actually want to hear the noise introduced by a poorly-engineered DAC. Would I need to buy one so terrible that it has a SINAD of 59 dB before I could really hear its contributions to my music over my room’s ambient background noise?
Question #4: I decide to compare the Topping D90 to the off-brand CrappyDAC, which has a measured SINAD of 61 dB. Assuming my room only allows for 60 dB of range between the loudest peaks and the ambient noise, will the D90 effectively sound less noisy than the CrappyDAC? Or will they both perform well enough that their introduced noise will be masked below the ambient sound in the room to effectively the same degree?
Can anyone help shed some light on these questions?
Thanks in advance,
Duane