Hi Amir, let me first tell you that I appreciate the work you do. Thanks to you I have the best affordable top speaker I could imagine (Neumann KH420). Before that I had the JBL HD1600 with a Purifi amplifier. Also thanks to your reviews. In general I love equipment that measures well AND have a sound I like.
So far the good news.
The impression anyone gets when reading your many reviews of DACs is that there is a race to the bottom. Nowadays a Topping costing 400 dollars measures good enough to participate in an absolute top system. Purifi amplifier, Revel floorstanders and you are in business. When something still is not sounding good it must be the acoustics.
As a result a lot of people buy a cheap Shenzhen dac and then they think they are ready. And ofcourse soon thereafter a new version of that dac comes out. Extremely hilarious because why would Shenzhen do that? Because of AudioScienceReview. The cheapest way to sell thousands of dacs worldwide. You should ask money for that.
For some time I believed it and ended with the Topping D90/PRE90 combination. Top high end, but after buying a RME ADI-2 FS I noticed that there are subtitle differences that make the RME for me listenable and the Toppings in comparison lifeless. You say that you have to make the output levels identical? Yes when you compare directly that is necessary. But I have all the time of the world so I listen weeks before I make a decision. With all kinds of volume levels. A natural person is not capable to do that? Maybe. But it’s the best we have. And I think that not everybody has the same capability to hear and remember. The golden ear thing. Well I don’t think I have golden ears, I know people that are much better than me. But my own wife really doesn’t hear any difference between anything. A sort of permanent ABX. She also does not taste the difference between an excellent and an average white wine. I love her very much.
And now the Chord Dave that I really, really purchased. I didn’t pay the full 12.000 euros because the dac exists since 2016 so there are always bargains. Mine was 7250 euro and was still new in the box. The owner bought the Chord Dave and after that he probably read your review and got something else.
Someone said the Dave would have tons of options and filters but that is not the case. It looks nice but is like equipment from the 80’s. But that doesn’t matter, the sound is absolutely terrific. After all the perfect measuring crap-dacs I had this finally sounds like something you can end with. This is not caused by distortion because therefore the Dave measures too good.
So to be honest, I feel a littlebit betrayed. I have been kept busy for years thinking that good measurements would also give you a good sound. And when dacs that I know are really good (Chord Dave and Mola Mola Tambaqui) are tested here they are immediately sabled down to the ground so that the minions here can say that their 400 dollar dac measures better.