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Do we need a DDC.....? Or is it BS....

FrantzM

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Wondering how many posters claiming “they’re pointless, you don’t need one” have actually tried a ddc in their systems. I’ve owned the Audiophileo, Wyred, Resonessence and now an expensive Berkeley DDC. With each I did extensive A/B testing on multiple systems with different dacs. I would love not to have one (who needs the extra cost, complexity, cables etc.?). For me however, they simply give better sound. Every time.

(To be clear, I’m specifically talking about converting USB outputs to different formats …and before you say “well he must have a player with ‘dirty’ usb output”, I’ll tell you that I’m using a JCat Femto usb card powered independently by a battery supply)

YMMV
Welcome to ASR.

Can you tell us how those A/B tests were performed? A bit about the systems? Any measurements?

Thanks in advance

Peace.
 

Jerr2501

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Welcome to ASR.

Can you tell us how those A/B tests were performed? A bit about the systems? Any measurements?

Thanks in advance

Peace.
Thanks for the welcome Frantz. Glad to finally post here.

A/B tests were performed blind (not double blind) using a test group of about 6-8 of my nerd audio friends, several occasions in several listening rooms. Too much gear to name. All pretty ‘high-end’ stuff ($5K+ dacs etc.) No measurements other than spl level matching.

I concede that our determinations were strictly subjective. My post was intended mainly to ask those who claim DDCs as useless “have you ever tried one?”. My experience is that many share strong opinions without any personal, real-world experience. Unlike the above poster who HAS tried several DDCs, found them ineffective or even harmful to the sound. There you go. Valid, experience based opinion. YMMV indeed!
 

mansr

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Wondering how many posters claiming “they’re pointless, you don’t need one” have actually tried a ddc in their systems.
Wondering how many posters claiming "it's pointless, you don't need it" have actually tried knowledge.
 

deadwood83

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I have one! Because my original dac only had AES, coax, spdif which my PC did not have.

Actually, I suppose I have one for every DAC I own since an XMOS implementation, Amanero unit, etc are all a type of DDC.

But this man wants folks to buy another one (because his pictured dac already has an inbuild DDC as can be seen by the USB port) and then so a stack, and then make a very rudimentary antenna between the two with a carefully looped cable?

"I care about jitter"
"Look at this antenna I made with my LVDS I2S cable!"

Actually his denafrips DAC or w/e on the bottom with XLR outs has a quite nice DDC implementation. I believe it;s a USB controller, STM32, and Xilinx FPGA sequence (same tech here, but licensed by Denafrips. You can see Xing in their FW updates) https://www.l7audiolab.com/f/xing-af200/

So he literally bypasses his Xingcore internal DDC with a longer antenna cable coming from an external Xingcore DDC? ANd adds two LVDS converters inline? And it makes it better? He is a funny man. He also does not look like he is not having a good time.
1666795444034.png



ETA: Don't believe Denafrips uses Xing? Look at their FW update instructions. Look at the command line screenshots. https://www.denafrips.com/firmware-update

He literally replaced X with X + cable.
 

sq225917

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DDC useful for format conversion or adding additional inputs, but unless you have some horrendous edge case they are unlikely to change the sound.
 

Matt Mexia

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I am so disappointed and embarrassed. I just spent $400.00 on an S.M.S.L M500 MKII and am in my music room listing to it decode MQA on Tidal thinking it was sounding great. Now I find out I should have just burned the money at a strip club. Before that I had a Audioengine D1 which fooled me into thinking it a a good little “consumer grade” DAC ,as well. I have been exposed as the fool I always feared I was. All of this is just an illusion…a mental placebo accepted by a gullible aging white male with limited resources and mental capacity. What’s next? Am I going to learn the old audiophile joke is true that bi-wiring speakers means you are just “buying” more speaker wire…for nothing? What about the myth that one needs to buy larger gauge, more expensive, speaker wire? That my Marantz and B&W speakers don’t sound any better than a $100 dollar Pyle amp bought on eBay or “white van” speakers I could have purchased in any parking lot in America?

You know, now that I have been enlightened, I realize that not only is the DAC doing nothing, but my entire system sounds like s**t. I knew I heard distortion in the left channel. I have been living an audio lie. This is my only hobby…my only respite from my dead-end job, my terrible health and my pitiful life. With a gun to my head, I am beginning to post my worthless gear on Craigslist. I hope I can recoup at least $50 bucks to help my wife offset a little of the cost of my cremation. Please pass on that I would like my ashes spread outside one of the last three existing Radio Shack stores. Something told me I should have never moved past my Optimus gear from the 70’s.
 

voodooless

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I am so disappointed and embarrassed. I just spent $400.00 on an S.M.S.L M500 MKII and am in my music room listing to it decode MQA on Tidal thinking it was sounding great. Now I find out I should have just burned the money at a strip club. Before that I had a Audioengine D1 which fooled me into thinking it a a good little “consumer grade” DAC ,as well. I have been exposed as the fool I always feared I was. All of this is just an illusion…a mental placebo accepted by a gullible aging white male with limited resources and mental capacity. What’s next? Am I going to learn the old audiophile joke is true that bi-wiring speakers means you are just “buying” more speaker wire…for nothing? What about the myth that one needs to buy larger gauge, more expensive, speaker wire? That my Marantz and B&W speakers don’t sound any better than a $100 dollar Pyle amp bought on eBay or “white van” speakers I could have purchased in any parking lot in America?

You know, now that I have been enlightened, I realize that not only is the DAC doing nothing, but my entire system sounds like s**t. I knew I heard distortion in the left channel. I have been living an audio lie. This is my only hobby…my only respite from my dead-end job, my terrible health and my pitiful life. With a gun to my head, I am beginning to post my worthless gear on Craigslist. I hope I can recoup at least $50 bucks to help my wife offset a little of the cost of my cremation. Please pass on that I would like my ashes spread outside one of the last three existing Radio Shack stores. Something told me I should have never moved past my Optimus gear from the 70’s.
1672645001014.jpeg
 
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