Is there really no audible difference between different DACs?

[Mnyb]

Sorry is this still about DAC’s on their own not also an eventual built in headphone amp in the DAC ?

 

[CelticForest]

Dacs id assume headphone amps are transparent as long as they are fed clean power and have enough juice to power ur headphones?

Well hopefully some can listen to the tracks i posted and tell me if their impressions on soundstage is the same as mine for example if i used a worse dac i would hear all of the things i posted inside my head only.... but maybe that is just my imagination

This is also a good example for me listening to this on my headphones sounds like im hearing it on speakers but on a " worse" dac i would hear it as if it was all in my head how is it for you guys?

 

[solderdude]

Before you start to invent the wheel again wade through this thread first

 

[ernestcarl]

This question has already been answered elsewhere here in other threads as well. Use the search box.

I have 8 DACs on one of my desks alone... probably more to come in the future (of the multichannel sort). Why? DACs are, in general, cheap and small. Is there a big difference in what I hear? No. Only one DAC (that I owned) was objectively subpar that I felt compelled to chug it in the trash bin. I wouldn't gift it or sell it to anyone -- nobody deserved that piece of crap. On the other hand, I don't buy "unmeasured" DACs or questionable items from questionable companies to begin with. You want to hear a big difference? Buy 10-100 different speakers... audition them in your acoustically compromised listening room. If you're just itching to be worried about something during the lonely nights, worry about your room acoustics. Your AC/heating, noise from neighbors and home appliances. Worry about the inevitable age-related hearing loss you will surely get -- if you're lucky enough to live so long... Your transducers/drivers, especially. For god's sake... look at all the FR plots all the supposedly "best" measuring speakers/subs and headphones posted on this forum, as well as many other audio forums elsewhere. DACs should be the least of your worries. Truly crap "sounding" DACs are few and far in between. So you have lots of money and want to spend it wisely? Hire a qualified acoustician to visit your home and tell them personally about your apparent audio problems. You'd get further ahead doing that one single task than by cycling through various DACs, combing through various audio forums, feeding your audiophilia nervosa over the years and decades.

Presumably, you've just been unlucky and got a hold of a total-piece-of-crap-engineered DAC. What to do? Purchase another one that measures well -- doesn't have to be uber expensive -- and that specifically fits your needs, and just be completely done with it. That is, unless you're the type who simply prefers DAC collecting to speaker/headphone collecting for whatever reason. I'm the type who would rather have a wall full of speakers -- or shelves and shelves of obsolete physical media e.g. *books, CDs and BDs -- than a drawer/closet full of DACs. *present small pile of DACs, notwithstanding.

 

[LTig]

His voice is inside my head between my ears but the sound of the guitar is comfortably outside of the earcups of my headphones
How does it sound like to other people here?

Same here; RME ADI-2 DAC fs feeding Beyerdynamik DT990Pro (250 Ohm). This not untypical though - mono mixed instruments and voices appear always within the head when listening via headphones.

Nice recording, btw.

 

[ernestcarl]

Ah, if it's just better headphone soundstage that you're after, try any number of crossfeed DSPs like the following: Redline Monitor or TB Isone (comes in the Bus Tools 3 bundle). There a bunch of others, these are just the ones I personally use.

 

[Mnyb]

Are we supposed to use the YouTube videos for our listening ? The audio compression algorithms in use on YouTube probably have magnitudes more problems than any reasonable DAC ? Maybe finding the same tracks from other sources.

Btw thanks for music suggestions, one reason to hang onto audio forums is to find new music.

There are only so much a DAC can do , soundstage deviations would require gross anomaly’s in frequency response or phase or channel balance or phase or time delay between channels, very obvious in a measurement . DAC is not where I would attribute these kind of differences . I can’t see a reasonable mechanism at work to do this in a good DAC

 

[Speedskater]

Dacs id assume headphone amps are transparent as long as they are fed clean power and have enough juice to power ur headphones?

Headphone amps are a special breed of animal, not a good idea to make any assumptions about them.
* * * * * * * * * * *
and headphones are another special breed of animal, don't make any assumptions about them either.

 

[WreckTangle]

This question has already been answered elsewhere here in other threads as well. Use the search box.

I have 8 DACs on one of my desks alone... probably more to come in the future (of the multichannel sort). Why? DACs are, in general, cheap and small. Is there a big difference in what I hear? No. Only one DAC (that I owned) was objectively subpar that I felt compelled to chug it in the trash bin. I wouldn't gift it or sell it to anyone -- nobody deserved that piece of crap. On the other hand, I don't buy "unmeasured" DACs or questionable items from questionable companies to begin with. You want to hear a big difference? Buy 10-100 different speakers... audition them in your acoustically compromised listening room. If you're just itching to be worried about something during the lonely nights, worry about your room acoustics. Your AC/heating, noise from neighbors and home appliances. Worry about the inevitable age-related hearing loss you will surely get -- if you're lucky enough to live so long... Your transducers/drivers, especially. For god's sake... look at all the FR plots all the supposedly "best" measuring speakers/subs and headphones posted on this forum, as well as many other audio forums elsewhere. DACs should be the least of your worries. Truly crap "sounding" DACs are few and far in between. So you have lots of money and want to spend it wisely? Hire a qualified acoustician to visit your home and tell them personally about your apparent audio problems. You'd get further ahead doing that one single task than by cycling through various DACs, combing through various audio forums, feeding your audiophilia nervosa over the years and decades.

Presumably, you've just been unlucky and got a hold of a total-piece-of-crap-engineered DAC. What to do? Purchase another one that measures well -- doesn't have to be uber expensive -- and that specifically fits your needs, and just be completely done with it. That is, unless you're the type who simply prefers DAC collecting to speaker/headphone collecting for whatever reason. I'm the type who would rather have a wall full of speakers -- or shelves and shelves of obsolete physical media e.g. CDs and BDs -- than a drawer/closet full of DACs. *present small pile of DACs, notwithstanding.

I forgot the email i used to log in with my profile so i made this one using my primary email

You seem quite antagonistic but i want to answer you anyway i dont worry about the fact that dacs might sound different i just find it really interesting that i can find such a substantital difference in sound quality between different dacs when there isn't even one in reality

I dont quote comb through audio forums to feed my quote audiophila nervosa either... i like this website a lot cause it makes messurments and it talks about these things on an mostly scientific basis!

Now i only posted these youtube videos because i felt that maybe if we shared notes on our listening experiences we might see just how similar they actually are i decided to concentrate on soundstage as a primary thing because i felt that if other people heew did not have the same impressions as me when it came to soundstage in these recordings then maybe there is something to dacs sounding different after all

I did write i was using a pair of beyerdynamic 880s they are known as very neutral headphones in fact beyerdynamic recomends them for mastering so i feel i gotta pretty good reference on what the recordings i posted sounds like youtube aint perfect no but its good enough to demonstrate the differences that i mentioned and also the easiest way to do so

 

[WreckTangle]

Same here; RME ADI-2 DAC fs feeding Beyerdynamik DT990Pro (250 Ohm). This not untypical though - mono mixed instruments and voices appear always within the head when listening via headphones.

Nice recording, btw.

Well for me the instruments they aint inside the head the guitar is outside of my head on both sides that is when i listen on my beyerdynamics 880s using the aune x1s as my headphone amp with the xp1s psu the dac is the musicstreamer hd

Now if i changed the dac to the dac inside the aune x1s for me the soundstage would shrink instantly something fierce! it would just all be inside my head

 

[WreckTangle]

Are we supposed to use the YouTube videos for our listening ? The audio compression algorithms in use on YouTube probably have magnitudes more problems than any reasonable DAC ? Maybe finding the same tracks from other sources.

Btw thanks for music suggestions, one reason to hang onto audio forums is to find new music.

There are only so much a DAC can do , soundstage deviations would require gross anomaly’s in frequency response or phase or channel balance or phase or time delay between channels, very obvious in a measurement . DAC is not where I would attribute these kind of differences . I can’t see a reasonable mechanism at work to do this in a good DAC

How about cleaner power? does it make sense that in my experience both headphone amps and dacs got a bigger soundstage when cleaner power is being fed to them?

 

[WreckTangle]

Before you start to invent the wheel again wade through this thread first

I will check it thanks!

 

[Rja4000]

Ah, if it's just better headphone soundstage that you're after, try any number of crossfeed DSPs like the following: Redline Monitor or TB Isone (comes in the Bus Tools 3 bundle). There a bunch of others, these are just the ones I personally use.

RME does that too

 

[ernestcarl]

Sorry

I forgot the email i used to log in with my profile so i made this one using my primary email

You seem quite antagonistic but i want to answer you anyway i dont worry about the fact that dacs might sound different i just find it really interesting that i can find such a substantital difference in sound quality between different dacs when there isn't even one in reality

I dont quote comb through audio forums to feed my quote audiophila nervosa either... i like this website a lot cause it makes messurments and it talks about these things on an mostly scientific basis!

Now i only posted these youtube videos because i felt that maybe if we shared notes on our listening experiences we might see just how similar they actually are i decided to concentrate on soundstage as a primary thing because i felt that if other people heew did not have the same impressions as me when it came to soundstage in these recordings then maybe there is something to dacs sounding different after all

I did write i was using a pair of beyerdynamic 880s they are known as very neutral headphones in fact beyerdynamic recomends them for mastering so i feel i gotta pretty good reference on what the recordings i posted sounds like youtube aint perfect no but its good enough to demonstrate the differences that i mentioned and also the easiest way to do so

Sorry if I came across as such — antagonistic? But I have those Beyers and I don’t think they are as neutral as you think. Maybe that’s a sign that I need to take a break and just enjoy the holidays. My blood pressure must on the rise again — prehypertension here. I’m still contending with my own room acoustics problems for another set of speakers in an imperfect room.

 

[ernestcarl]

RME does that too

Well, in this case, literally every crossfeed I’ve tested has been very different sounding from the next one.

 

[WreckTangle]

Sorry


Sorry if I came across as such — antagonistic? But I have those Beyers and I don’t think they are as neutral as you think. Maybe that’s a sign that I need to take a break and just enjoy the holidays. My blood pressure must on the rise again — prehypertension here. I’m still contending with my own room acoustics problems for another set of speakers in an imperfect room.

well neutral compared to a lot of other headphones especially at its price

I will also check out these dsps with crossfeed and see what that might sound like when i have the time

 

[VintageFlanker]

What others said. All DACs don't sound the same... But all transparent DACs should have to sound the same. If not, they aren't...transparent.

This is also a good example for me listening to this on my headphones sounds like im hearing it on speakers but on a " worse" dac i would hear it as if it was all in my head how is it for you guys?

@CelticForest : All the song you quoted don't help much. In that kind of case, people are always describing the specificities of the recording itslef and not the ones of the gears.

For example the Aune x1s i use the
AUNE XP1 External Linear Power Supply

and for me that drastically improves the headphone amplifier

And that is another topic. By the way, if some DAC does need an external PSU to operate properly, then it is a bad designed DAC. You have to know I used to have a Aune stack: X1S + X7S, both powered by XP1s. When I bought XP1s, I assume I wasn't able to hear any improvements because there wasn't any.

I'm 100% sure you're a victim of expectation bias in that case.

The headamp is already transparent enough (from 1 to 100mW under 300Ω), though not the cleanest:

At last, would be glad to know what are the "many DACs" you own. That could help to understand.

 

[raif71]

Welcome to ASR @CelticForest . Yeah I feel for you. @VintageFlanker , what is transparent dac?

 

[VintageFlanker]

@VintageFlanker , what is transparent dac?

Something which has a dead flat FR, and noise, distortion, IMD, crosstalk, linearity, dynamic range all beneath (or "above") audibility thresholds.

There is no magic behind it.

 

[solderdude]

But I have those Beyers and I don’t think they are as neutral as you think.

DT880 (250 Ohm which has a slightly higher treble peak than the 600 Ohm)

one ply of toilet paper lowers the treble a bit: