pinpoint_oxford
Active Member
The hidden secret is our brains and how we think something sounds
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Master Thread: Are Measurements Everything or Nothing?
- Thread starter amirm
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Au contraire mon frère, I think that the iPhone 12 Pro Max with its 6.7in screen, high resolution screen is better than standalone streamers with their remotes that generally don't even have a display. The iphone's big screen shows me the song lyrics that I can karaoke to.
The Apple Music app shows the album art cover, lets me browse the genere, album, artist, makes suggestions for new songs.
I've also read that battery powered devices have less noise than a/c electrical outlets that feed standalone streamers.
Reasonably priced (under $600 USD) standalone streamers that can play Apple Music use Apple Airplay2 via wireless streaming which can only decode Apple Music normal lossless, not Apple Music hi-res lossless. Airplay2 would just be mirroring my iPhone so the standalone streamer would be a waste. There are european streamers (Magna Hifi Mano Music Streamer) that have an i2S port and can play Apple Music format ALAC natively instead of using Airplay2 but they cost $1300 + shipping cost to the US.
Not to mention that with the money I saved from not buying a standalone streamer, I used that money to upgrade my Arcam AVR5 to the Parasound 2250 V.2 amplifier.
In the future I might add the Denafrips Iris which is a DDC to cleanup the digital source before going into the DAC and I'll be able to use the i2S port:
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Count Dacula
Senior Member
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I can tell which denomination coin was dropped on the floor. Not even difficult for most here... hopefully. Maybe a fair test would be to see how many different coins you could hear at once.
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solderdude
Grand Contributor
My wife doesn't care about the denomination of coins as long as she can spend it.
zepplock
Active Member
e.g., realism, 3D, details, tight bass, tonality, attack/power, fullness/thinness, decay - just your feelings. None of that is relevant to audio quality.
Well maybe decay does, but it's not part a dac anyway.
pinpoint_oxford
Active Member
My streamer is just a PC I built with USB out to the DAC running Roon as an endpoint. I use my phone or laptop to do all the same things you describe. My comment was more that I would not want to have my phone tethered to my hi-fi to listen, that is what seems bananas to me.
If it works for you, cheers mate!
My system is really a home theater (7.2.4 setup with 150in screen) with the equipments located a foot behind my couch in a 6' bookcase with the projector on top, and I'm really listening/paying attention to the music's sound quality and not walking around the room so I don't mind being tethered by the USB cable.
If the music were just playing in the background (I don't care about sound quality as much), then I would want wireless to move freely around the room/house; for that I use the 7 Denon Heos (with builtin amp/streamer) spread throughout the house.
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That's incorrect about the maximum sample rate speed of 48 kHz. Wikipedia says that for digital audio via HDMI can go up to 192 kHz:
So maybe a future AppleTV4k will give us hires lossless music (AppleTV4k currently can only play normal lossless).
HDMI - Wikipedia
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That's incorrect. Wikipedia says that for digital audio via HDMI:
If an HDMI device has audio, it is required to implement the baseline format: stereo (uncompressed) PCM. Other formats are optional, with HDMI allowing up to 8 channels of uncompressed audio at sample sizes of 16 bits, 20 bits, or 24 bits, with sample rates of 32 kHz, 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz, 88.2 kHz, 96 kHz, 176.4 kHz, or 192 kHz
So maybe a future AppleTV4k will give us hires lossless music (AppleTV4k currently can only play normal lossless).
HDMI - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
The Apple TV hdmi port for apple music is still limited to 24bit 48khz.
So it's correct.
What future updates might do or not is not important at this moment for someone that wants to use apple music with high-res tracks trough a apple TV.
For apple music I would just use a iPad with usb out straight into a DAC.
HarmonicTHD
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If I had a dollar for everytime I heard that nonsense. ….
Any hard facts or still spreading anecdotes and hearsay?
If I were to get a streamer, which ones work with Apple Music via Airplay2 and has a USB output?
The ifi zen streamer is the cheapest device I can find that has both Apple Music via Airplay2 and has a USB output.
Raspberry pi 4 with Roopiee XL (AirPlay, roon, NAA etc).
I use it to cast audio from a iPad to my headphone setup to watch movies In the evening.
But why not just connect a iPad with usb directly to a DAC if all that is required is apple music?
hi.
For wireless I don’t want to build a pi, and Jay’s Iyagi said it doesn’t sound as good.
For wired hires lossless, i currently use my iphone12proMax with the apple lightning-to-usbCamera adapter but it will eventually have dropouts due to the wire being bent due to usage.
but at $15 used to $30 new versus a $400 Ifi zen streamer, i could replace 14 lightning-to-usb dongles and have Hires lossless.
currently my wireless streamer is the Apple airport express (airplay2) via optical into the Denafrips Ares II 12th, and i cant hear a difference compared to wired USB using the lightning-to-usbCamera dongle.
I found some great streamers with airplay2 and i2S port.
3 youtubers have said that the Ares II 12th with the Denafrips Iris (a DDC) via i2S port significantly improved sound quality to match the higher model Denafrips Pontus in all facets except details (the Pontus has 4 rows of r2r versus 2 rows in the Ares II 12th).
If a streamer has i2S, then i don’t need the Iris to convert usb to i2S.
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Killingbeans
Major Contributor
The dude has a seriously lively imagination...
The statement of 3 YouTubers does not make an accurate assessment of reality. Don't listen to those people. Learn about how things really work, and do your own assessment. Or at least listen to people who really knows and don't have a horse in the race. There's more than a few in here.
Nobody needs external I2S, IMO. But whatever helps you sleep at night
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Correct, i2S is not a need, it's a want. ;-)Nobody needs external I2S, IMO. But whatever helps you sleep at night
We don't need any of this hifi equipment, we really only need music via AM radio.
The 3 youtubers who reviewed my Ares II 12th and the Iris are: A British Audiophile, Tharbamar, and Wave Theory.The dude has a seriously lively imagination...
The statement of 3 YouTubers does not make an accurate assessment of reality. Don't listen to those people. Learn about how things really work, and do your own assessment. Or at least listen to people who really knows and don't have a horse in the race. There's more than a few in here.
Nobody needs external I2S, IMO. But whatever helps you sleep at night
They make a living with this stuff... It's not surprising that they review this stuff the way they do. Because they want to get more of it send by the manufacturers.
Would U send stuff out for free to people that review products as a waste of space?
Think of them as shills rather then ‘reviewers’,
Keith
Keith
You don't seem to understand that the best metrics may not be the most fun.
Example: I have a bought new bold red 2017 Corvette with the upgraded 4 big center mounted louder exhausts and stickshift. I could have bought a Tesla that I test drove which by metrics is quieter and even more autonomous than my Vette's manual stickshift that I have to row the gears.
But the Vette is 10 times more fun because it's sexy, has a removable roof, rumbles, loud, the stickshift/clutch feel like extensions of my limbs, real gauges and knobs for that tactile awesomeness, corners like it's on rails at 1.1+ lateral G, stops from 60mph-0 in 90ft.
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Killingbeans
Major Contributor
My bet would be that they share a belief in the same mythology. If they had no idea what was in the box, what its price tag was, or what kind of reputation the manufacturer has, the three "reviews" would be wildly different. Both from the R2R mythology and from each other.
Completely useless as data points, if you ask me.
A better car analogy would be two vehicles that both has performance beyond human comprehension in any possible way. The exhausts sound better than humans can perceive. The stickshift/clutch feels more perfect than the human senses can appreciate. And so on, and so on.
Honestly doesn't make any sense. A car analogy doesn't really work.
That's the main problem. The high-end audio industry really likes pushing the idea of any and all audio components having a "feel" and/or a "personality". It's relatable and it sells well. The fact that human hearing has limits, and that most components in a well designed playback chain hit those limits with ease, is not very fun or sexy.
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