DAC ABX shootout - unable to distinguish between 10$ and 15k$

[DonR]

Congratulations, you have discovered that your Ferrari is subject to the same speed limit as your Chevy

 

[Zensō]

Its a tough one to swallow, I still need to comprehend it. Somewhere deep I still blame the "mid-tier" HD650, although they have given me many, many hours of hi-fi pleasure. Soon to perform a test with Audeze LCD-5 to fully seal the deal on the DAC selection..

It’s not the headphones (though you already knew that). Thanks for sharing this, it’s not often that someone will experience this kind of revelation and be self-confident enough to share it on a public forum. And congratulations on learning something profound about the human mind and our ability to convince ourselves of almost anything we want to believe. You‘ve just saved yourself a ton of money and avoided many years of audio nervosa and delusions.

 

[tvrgeek]

Comments to multiple posts:

Echoes made a valid test for himself. He understands what he can and can't hear. That does not mean it applies to 7.8 billion other people.

I have used ASR a few times to make a purchase decision. Of that experience, I would have never found SCHIIT or JDS. I have returned two TOPPING, one SMSL, and one Sennheiser product as unsuitable even though they got exceptional reviews. Bench tests don't tell you about things like stability or compatibility. 4 losers, 1winner. Probably better than Consumers Reports though.

I prefer to be honest and declare there are things I do not understand than to take the all knowing declarative of some here who seem to be clairvoyant and know what I can and can't hear because they read it somewhere. That has no more validity than me proclaiming my beer tastes better with some amplifier than another. You could not prove it doesn't any more than I could prove it does.

"At the point where measured differences are overwhelmingly likely to make zero audible difference,"
This is absolutely the key point. MEASURED differences. I agree with that. It is no more than an ignorant belief that the measurements made, as good as they are, are the complete differences. That I can hear the difference between the XT-25/G30, 29TFF/W, 27TDFC, not exhibiting the "glare" symptom with either DAC and the 27TBCD and 27TAC/GB do with only some, suggests to me there is something to be learned. Both about tweeters and about the DAC.s There are large differences in the sonic character of these tweeters, but for the specific symptom I hear, those differences are not relevant.

"Congratulations, you have discovered that your Ferrari is subject to the same speed limit as your Chevy"
Actually a very good example that if the speed limit is the measured parameter, there is no difference. Driving either down a public road, the differences are large. My experience says it is more fun to drive a slow car fast than a fast car slow. Even at F.A.T. Others have different experiences. Do you have a measurement for Italian car "passion"? Or can you quantify the personality of British cars? German? French? An objective measurement please. Then you could design to it unlike modern major production cars that are all measuring very good, and all boring as hell to drive.

A link to a "blind test" on the WEB. Sorry, just totally ignorant. The test plays through your own DAC, speakers-phones etc. Masking makes it totally irrelevant.

If the moderators here believe that only a narrow test of something is all knowing and the only last word, do not believe there is anything else to understand, learn, or measure, believe everyone on the planet hears exactly the same thing, support only those who believe everything sounds the same because they read some contrived test somewhere, find they can't tolerate someone interested in advancing the science of measurement or understanding hearing perceptions, and only support those who debase someone who's experience suggests otherwise, feel free to remove my account. There are forums where differences in experience are respected and people are interested in advancing our understanding, tests, and the end goal of enjoying their music.

 

[dominikz]

A link to a "blind test" on the WEB. Sorry, just totally ignorant. The test plays through your own DAC, speakers-phones etc. Masking makes it totally irrelevant.

It is always sad to see an ad-hominem right of the bat.
Have you read at least the OP of the linked thread?

 

[tvrgeek]

yes

 

[pkane]

I prefer to be honest and declare there are things I do not understand than to take the all knowing declarative of some here who seem to be clairvoyant and know what I can and can't hear because they read it somewhere. That has no more validity than me proclaiming my beer tastes better with some amplifier than another. You could not prove it doesn't any more than I could prove it does.

Personally, I prefer to learn about things I don't understand before making public statements about them.

 

[antcollinet]

These tests , with all good intentions, are not conclusive beyond the OP. I can't tell him what he does or does not hear, and no one can tell me what I hear and do not hear.

I found on SOME tracks, on SOME speakers, on SOME DACs, there to be a clear, as in walk by glaringly clear, difference audible to SOME people. Not talking about some abstract "musicality" or pick your blog reviewer string of vague words. For me, it is something that causes a specific unpleasant "glare" in the midrange. Soprano vocals and more obviously the sound of a cymbal. To a lessor extent, trumpets and violins. Very clear to me and more so to my wife. "Good" and "bad" do not track with price. On serval sets of headphones, I too could hear no difference even listening carefully, eyes open, to the specific issue at hand. I do find it interesting all of the sounds are from instruments with very rich and broad overtones. I suspect that is a clue. I have theories but I could not correlate them to the tests Amir published. I suspect, on some much better headphones, with much younger ears, and some select recordings, differences in detail right at the threshold of hearing may be audible, but not for me. Differences in the source material dithering may or may not mask details at that level if the DAC is of sufficient quality ( Apple dongle or better). It seems a very bright EQ is preferred by some and that may make those differences to be real, not just bloggers filling space. Not for me.

In other words, it is still a bit more complicated. Not mentioned is some of the higher priced units have intentional distortions to add " warmth" or "color" as many believe these distortions to add to their enjoyment. Some of these are made up in advertising, some are clearly audible. The question is personal which is better for them. Some prefer tube amplifiers, some prefer LPs. I seem to prefer MOSFET power amps. I can't tell you why. Just over time, I seem to enjoy the music more. FWIW, my amplifiers actually do measure in the traditional SINAD very well but of all the amplifiers I have tried at home, the only bi-polar I liked was the Aragon. All the rest were MOSFET. Well, to think about it , my old Creek sounds fine, but I only have ever used it for background music. Not quite big enough for my main system. If we really knew what our brain interprets as musical, we could implement a set of transfer functions in DSP and we could pick the one that suits us best. We just don't know. It is science, not magic. With science, we should peruse the reasonings. Not claim they don't exist.

The good news for me is the JDS DAC+ does not have the issue I am sensitive to and I my tweeter testing suggests that after my swap, neither will my Schiit. So, had the Topping not had the driver incompatibilities and dropout issues, it too would have been fine and the feature set was worth the price to me. With the JDS I hear nothing wrong and find listening for hours to be enjoyable. That is the parameter that maters most to me. I kind of miss the remote volume control as some of my disks are from the loudness wars, and others much wider dynamic range so could use a boost to seem the same level. I would rather not have to get up to adjust.

A conclusion might be if you have money to spend, use it on the speakers and environment and not the DAC. I see questions on other forums asking if that $1000 DAC would help the "soundstage" on their $500/pair speakers. My answer will remain "No, but $50 worth of OC 705 and a used sheet will"

Which is great - but unless you've validated your impressions of (eg) "unpleasant glare" with controlled blind abx - you don't even know if you are actually hearing this or if your auditory system is making it up. If you are insisting you hear these things without blind testing then *you* are the one unscientfically claiming things don't exist (the "things" in this case, being the ability of your brain to fool you)

 

[BDWoody]

If the moderators here believe that only a narrow test of something is all knowing and the only last word, do not believe there is anything else to understand, learn, or measure, believe everyone on the planet hears exactly the same thing, support only those who believe everything sounds the same because they read some contrived test somewhere, find they can't tolerate someone interested in advancing the science of measurement or understanding hearing perceptions, and only support those who debase someone who's experience suggests otherwise, feel free to remove my account.

 

[pkane]

View attachment 188230

Don't need no stinkin' evidence! I know how I feel, what more do you want from me?

 

[Zensō]

View attachment 188230

It's hard for some to admit that we're all carrying around a large bundle of bias that we're mostly unaware of. Even though it's a natural trait in all humans, the fact that we're often deluding ourselves can be an unsettling idea.

 

[DonR]

If people can believe there are audible differences in something as simple as a cable, it should come as no surprise that there are far more that believe there are audible differences in something as complicated as a DAC.

 

[BDWoody]

If people can believe there are audible differences in something as simple as a cable, it should come as no surprise that there are far more that believe there are audible differences in something as complicated as a DAC.

The good news is that ignorance can be cured.

Edit: to state the obvious...there CAN be audible differences between these things, but knowledge removes the random element of how it might perform.

 

[LightninBoy]

If people can believe there are audible differences in something as simple as a cable, it should come as no surprise that there are far more that believe there are audible differences in something as complicated as a DAC.

Not only do people believe in audible differences between two simple cables, they believe in audible differences between the *same* cable after 100 hours of burn in.

 

[LightninBoy]

The good news is that ignorance can be cured.

Show me the evidence.

 

[pkane]

Show me the evidence.

See the OP in this very thread

 

[Zensō]

Show me the evidence.

"Result.. We could not tell the difference reliably between the systems. Which is.. proving either that we are both deaf or audio fools. We are repeating the test this Friday, I will post update if I can still type though my tears. Silly enough I can 100% reliably say which one is better when I see what system is connected."

 

[radix]

Hello All,

First of all, thank you for the forum contributors who are sharing their knowledge here. I started reading ASR two month ago and just can't get enough of it.
I am sharing my experience with my first ABX testing. Last Friday me, together with a friend performed a double blind test on this systems:

1) Chord Dave + Upscaller from Chord2Go+2U - headphone output
2) Topping D90 + A90 from a laptop
3) Chord Mojo headphone output from Iphone.
4) Apple lightning 3.5mm adapter, output from Iphone.

Volume matching was performed with a dedicated microphone, nothing fancy, but still more reliable that our ears as proven below.
Switching between sources was done though a 4 position 3 pole rotary switch box, unbalanced 6.3mm cables.
Headphones used were the Seinheiser HD650, standard.
Switching was done randomly by my wife, who, with her scientific background, was happy to assist on this.

Result.. We could not tell the difference reliably between the systems. Which is.. proving either that we are both deaf or audio fools. We are repeating the test this Friday, I will post update if I can still type though my tears. Silly enough I can 100% reliably say which one is better when I see what system is connected.

@Echoes, thanks for the experiment. I'd like to understand your methodology. I'm interested in the process and repeatability of an experiment.

1. What audio did you use to level match? pink noise? At what level at the mic?
2. Did you do ABCDX, where ABCD are random order then randomly pick one for X, then ask "which one is X?"
3. Or did you do randomized pairwise comparisons?
4. How long were each sample played?
5. How many different samples did your have, and were they randomized order?
6. Could you list the tracks you used, I wonder how broad an audio gamut they span.

Thanks.

BTW, I recently started using this 1:4 (or 4:1) switchbox from Nobosound. With a little two-sided tape to the desk, it works very well.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07Q1W4484

 

[Pdxwayne]

Since we have helps, can we skip the switch? I always have a suspicion that the switch could do something to the signals.....

Blindfold the Op, wife manually move the headphones plug to different headphones amp, would that work?

 

[Gene LeClair]

Cool test! If there's nothing wrong with those devices, I guess that's what should happen.

When it comes to DACs, it's not really about "making it sound better". It's more about "not making it sound significantly worse".

 

[pkane]

Since we have helps, can we skip the switch? I always have a suspicion that the switch could do something to the signals.....

Blindfold the Op, wife manually move the headphones plug to different headphones amp, would that work?

This is OK to do, but it does make the test a bit more difficult, as it takes some time and possibly creates some noise while the connections are being moved. It is harder to compare two sounds if the switch takes longer than a few seconds. Any noise/clicks, etc., in between the two comparison tracks will also make it harder to compare directly. In some cases, this is the best one can do, but if possible, a quick, noiseless switchover is preferable.