‘As good as it gets’ Benchmark’s DAC3

[svart-hvitt]

The name of the players is not something that is stamped into music as to then be evaluated in the context of reviewing hardware. Saying the Piano notes were reproduces this and that way is fine. Saying Joe played the piano is not.

Take this turntable review by Herb: https://www.stereophile.com/content/gramophone-dreams18-amg-giro-turntable

"Remasterings of recordings make me angry—they mess with my memories of the songs I love, especially songs from the 1960s that I played in my bedroom on a cheap Garrard turntable through Lafayette speakers. Like my first girlfriend, these songs permanently entered my psyche and modified my DNA.

When songs I've heard a thousand times are remastered or remixed, they sound wrong and weird to me. They make my inner hard drive skip as I try to figure out what was changed, and why. This is especially true with Beatles reissues.

One day, in high school, the nerdy girl who sat in front of me in math turned around and said, "The Beatles are coming! The Beatles are coming!" I groaned and rolled my eyes.

I didn't like the Beatles. Hipsters like me gave no mind to the British Invasion. I was the right age, but where I grew up, Otis Redding and Wilson Pickett trumped all that Liverpudlian pop. I didn't like the Beatles until they stopped playing stadiums and started making statement albums that merged art, pop music, and light social commentary. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, released in the US on June 2, 1967, was the first Beatles record I bought.

Today, listening to the 50th-anniversary remix and remastering of Sgt. Pepper's (2 LPs, Parlophone PCS 7027), I submitted once again to those mop-top rockers. Guess what? It's déjà vu all over again.

The new edition of Sgt. Pepper's is the remastering I always dreamed of but never thought would actually happen. George Martin's son, Giles Martin, and Abbey Road audio engineer Sam Okell have created this revelatory remix from the original four-track master tapes—revelatory because this reissue eliminates the haze, the hard textures, the questionable stereo of my original US pressing (Capitol SMAS-2653).​

What is all this doing in a turntable review? It just reads like name dropping, bragging, and off-topic filler in a hardware review.

Maybe Stereophile pay per word in article?

 

[Sal1950]

News flash!..., the world of the audiophile is highly self indulgent.

Some might say grotesquely self indulgent...

So is the high end world of just about any hobby-collectors group that takes deep pockets to participate in.
But some are almost purely subjective (art, fashion) some are almost purely objective (performance autos, racing, sports) .
Unfortunately the high end audio market, which should be much closer to a purely objective rating scale, has been led down the road fantasy and financial bragging rights. There is little support in it's surrounding media for anything beyond a little club guys deciding how to promote the profit side of the industry, honesty and integrity be damned.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

If that was really the goal, the same recordings would be used by the same reviewer each time, but that's rarely the case.

I don't agree. Some recordings allow one to perceive certain characteristics that other will not. For example (an obvious one), one would not choose a recording of Bach's Solo Partitas and Sonatas for Violin to evaluate bass extension and quality. Also, I do tend to use the same group of recordings because my intimate familiarity with them is useful although, over the years, some slip aside and are replaced by others.

And if a publication was serious about standards, they'd use the same recordings across all reviewers, which nobody does.

Gratefully, we do not as I cannot tolerate a lot of the choices of others (and I am sure they will say the same).

I sometimes find it indulgent, especially Herb Reichert's recent tendencies to use historic (like nearly 100 year old) blues / bluegrass recordings from the Smithsonian, which may be culturally important, but are terrible fidelity.

Lastly, it gets boring. I usually skim / skip it, because unless I have that specific recording, it means nothing to me.

Fine with me but it is there for those who won them or are motivated to buy them.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

....................................................................

What is all this doing in a turntable review? It just reads like name dropping, bragging, and off-topic filler in a hardware review.

Dunno. I never read turntable reviews.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

Maybe Stereophile pay per word in article?

Nope. Flat fee.

 

[RobP]

As I read it, the comparison you mention was between a PS Audio DAC and the DAC3

Thanks for pointing this out. I'm still not clear though that the reviewer was comparing DAC3 to PS Audio DAC, since the Stereophile "Best of 2018" summary article linked below seems to say he was comparing DAC1 to DAC3 HGC:

...after rigorously comparing the DAC3 HGC with his own Benchmark DAC1, JCA heard no differences whatsoever: The new, like the old, impressed him as a product of "astonishing fidelity and emotional expressiveness."

https://www.stereophile.com/content/recommended-components-2018-edition-digital-processors

 

[RayDunzl]

I'm still not clear though that the reviewer was comparing DAC3 to PS Audio DAC

One drink too many in RC-entry for Benchmark DAC3

Editor:

One wonders whether whoever wrote the entry for the Benchmark DAC3in "Recommended Components" in your April-issue had one drink too many- or let PS Audio-owner Paul McGowan write the entry.

Your entry reads that "after rigorously comparing the DAC3HGC with his own Benchmark DAC1, JCA heard no difference whatsoever".
In fact, Jim Austin heard a huge difference between the DAC1 and DAC3. "The DAC1 was brighter, all sheen and surface. The DAC3 was all about depths, in several respects: the sound was weightier, with a darker frequency balance; the soundstage was deeper...the difference between Benchmark' first- and third generation DACs wasn't subtle."

Where Jim Austin and two other listeners did not hear indeed any difference was between the DAC3 and the nearly three times as expensive PS Audio Direct Stream DAC: "Neither of us heard a difference - nothing."

I think you owe Benchmark Audio a correction and apology. Also, I wonder why the DAC3HGC, if it is that good, does not get a rating for extraordinary value.

Regards,
Florian Hassel

https://www.stereophile.com/content/one-drink-too-many-rc-entry-benchmark-dac3

DAC3 review:
https://www.stereophile.com/content/benchmark-dac3-hgc-da-preamplifier-headphone-amplifier

 

[RobP]

One drink too many in RC-entry for Benchmark DAC3

Thanks Ray!

 

[svart-hvitt]

One drink too many in RC-entry for Benchmark DAC3

Editor:

One wonders whether whoever wrote the entry for the Benchmark DAC3in "Recommended Components" in your April-issue had one drink too many- or let PS Audio-owner Paul McGowan write the entry.

Your entry reads that "after rigorously comparing the DAC3HGC with his own Benchmark DAC1, JCA heard no difference whatsoever".
In fact, Jim Austin heard a huge difference between the DAC1 and DAC3. "The DAC1 was brighter, all sheen and surface. The DAC3 was all about depths, in several respects: the sound was weightier, with a darker frequency balance; the soundstage was deeper...the difference between Benchmark' first- and third generation DACs wasn't subtle."

Where Jim Austin and two other listeners did not hear indeed any difference was between the DAC3 and the nearly three times as expensive PS Audio Direct Stream DAC: "Neither of us heard a difference - nothing."

I think you owe Benchmark Audio a correction and apology. Also, I wonder why the DAC3HGC, if it is that good, does not get a rating for extraordinary value.

Regards,
Florian Hassel

https://www.stereophile.com/content/one-drink-too-many-rc-entry-benchmark-dac3

DAC3 review:
https://www.stereophile.com/content/benchmark-dac3-hgc-da-preamplifier-headphone-amplifier

In other words, a decade old DAC, that is a few hundred dollars in the second hand market (or about $1000 refurbished) is as good (A+) as a DAC that costs 10k dollars or more. Straight from the horse’s mouth, which is Stereophile in this case.

Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor's_New_Clothes