Audio GD - bad rap in the past -new breed !!

[Veri]

Lets see what survives longer, the NFB-11.38 or D30 Pro

Well, sure. Let's see

 

[atmfrank]

Kinda pointless to jump into the fray so late, but I like to make a few subjective comments here. I value ARS, I also value the evolutionary nature of HIFI. To me Audio-gd is a grown-up DIY hobbyist business. The proprietor doesn't make any secrets about it. Plenty of components in the box? Sure because he is not connected with commercial chip factories that will condense whole circuit boards into a single chip. That cost $$, eliminates component failure potential but also removes further tinkering with the circuits. Because you better be 100% sure that your circuit design is rock-solid, tested, tried repeatedly. Less noise/better measurements for sure.

BTW, Burson makes a good business out of "discrete op-amp design".

Wind the clock back 50 years and imagine how people would react if the Dynaco ST70 self-assembled power amp hits the market. Was it taken seriously back then? Clearly, there were less equipment choices and it was a much smaller market.

I am operating two Precision 3 amps for 4 years now in two of my modest stacks: Dynaudio Contour 20, Excite 14, Denafrips Ares II, SMSL SU-9, Burson Conductor, plus vinyl gear. The amps are performing flawless so far, warm, rich sound, great dynamics under low and high gain conditions. Even when driving the Contour 20's hard, a single P3 holds up well. $500 incl. shipping. You get what you pay for.

In the marketing section for the P3, they directly talk about the diamond-cross output design (late 60ties design - not very successful) "not measuring well" and the pro and cons for using the design. I do not see deceptive advertising, perhaps some omissions with providing measurements.

I wonder how well a Dynaco ST70 would measure....people still love these amps.

 

[amirm]

I wonder how well a Dynaco ST70 would measure....people still love these amps.

It measures within shouting distance of a number of modern modern solid state amplifiers! See: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...review-and-measurements-of-dynaco-st-70.7224/

 

[amirm]

Plenty of components in the box? Sure because he is not connected with commercial chip factories that will condense whole circuit boards into a single chip. That cost $$, eliminates component failure potential but also removes further tinkering with the circuits. Because you better be 100% sure that your circuit design is rock-solid, tested, tried repeatedly. Less noise/better measurements for sure.

Companies can build audio products out of anything they want. That is their concern, not ours. Ours (audiophiles) is to get a performant audio device. It is not like you are going to keep the top open and hang the thing on the wall and rave about all the parts. You listen to the thing. In case of Audio-gd products, they post measurements that are NOT representative of the product performance. Folks go by them and think they are getting something good with the explanation what you give: lots of parts so it must be good. Well, it is not. Spreading a design across large boards with tons of components with who knows what spec is a recipe for sub-optimal design. Again, if they can make it work, kudos to them. But they don't.

 

[amirm]

BTW, Burson makes a good business out of "discrete op-amp design".

They do make good business. Alas, in all the testing I have done, they only cost money but don't improve performance. Here is where one of their complete products ranks: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...urson-soloist-3xp-review-headphone-amp.34353/

Audiophiles need to stop being their own "brain surgeons" thinking they are design engineers and know what is good or is not. It is so easy to fool people who don't have proper engineering background with this and that story about the design. Instead, they need to learn to read measurements and insist on that data showing performance. If they think only the sound matters, then they should stop making arguments about this and that design being better. And ask for controlled blind tests that the sound is indeed better. Failing that, again, they need to trust the measurement data and information assessments you see here. There is no other logical path.

 

[lateralous]

Plenty of components in the box? Sure because he is not connected with commercial chip factories that will condense whole circuit boards into a single chip. That cost $$, eliminates component failure potential but also removes further tinkering with the circuits. Because you better be 100% sure that your circuit design is rock-solid, tested, tried repeatedly. Less noise/better measurements for sure.

You have this completely backwards, a minute of digging would show how easily one can obtain the exact same DAC chips used in many high performing products. I don't know where you live, but I'd wager you yourself could you have thousands of them on your doorstep within a couple days. Fully discrete designs are going to be more expensive in most cases. It also seems strange to conclude that (by your admission) the DIY hobbyist is capable of engineering a discrete design that can compete with SOCs produced by actual R&D teams with millions in backing.

 

[Palladium]

You have this completely backwards, a minute of digging would show how easily one can obtain the exact same DAC chips used in many high performing products. I don't know where you live, but I'd wager you yourself could you have thousands of them on your doorstep within a couple days. Fully discrete designs are going to be more expensive in most cases. It also seems strange to conclude that (by your admission) the DIY hobbyist is capable of engineering a discrete design that can compete with SOCs produced by actual R&D teams with millions in backing.

I dunno but all that seems to be a pointless exercise, when the music already goes through relatively horribly distorting mics, several thousand times of NE5532s bargain basement op-amps, single digit $ per meter cables and countless PC-based EQ/mixing in the recording studio. Some genres like pop might not even have an analog source for instrumentation.

 

[Malaj]

Audio GD is a perfect example how little measurements matter sometimes. Do I hear a ton of distortion in my cheap as hell audio gd c-2? No more then on my thx 789 AAA or topping A90.

The chinese to english translations seem to be one of the reason of course they get so much flac except for being chinese. They don´t use negative feedback they themself suggest they won´t measure well but if it´s all the negative feedback that cut off all transients short on the my thx 789 AAA in the hunt of insane SNR numbers I sure as hell don´t want that. I do feel there is some good ears at Audio GD

Topping A90 was not nearly quite as bad as the thx 789 AAA is and always has been. Costs quite a bit more too but it´s still really not something that sounds real to my ears. I rather take an amp that measure bad and actually sound good then something that on a paper sound good. The race is lost before you start as a neutral headphone don´t exist anyway.

I am looking into a master 19 to replace my C-2. I guess it measure worse as there is more components in it.