Jimster480
Major Contributor
That is true too, having overlayed measurements to show exactly what is different between different pieces of hardware is what I have been looking for since I started this hobby!
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Measurement and Review of Emotiva DC-1 DAC
- Thread starter amirm
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- emotiva dc-1 review
nefilim
Member
Looks like this product isn't being sold anymore...
OP
- Thread Starter
- #43
I think I heard there is a new one coming? But you are right, there is nothing on their website in this class.
Yes, I'm sure it's only coincidence but the DC-1 was removed from their site within a week or two of Amirs tests being posted. There's been talk of the DC-2 replacement for over a year now but nothing as yet for sale.
BTW, to Emotiva's credit they never debated or complained over any of the criticisms made in the two reviews. Only a couple fanboys came on the forum to whine but company spokesman KeithL was very kool and gentleman like over the whole thing.
Salute KeithL
http://emotivalounge.proboards.com/post/933754/thread
nefilim
Member
Agreed, nicely handled by Emotiva
Interesting anecdote about the DC-1, which I believe says more about my ears than the unit itself. I had a DC-1 around three years ago. I was initially wowed by it, being the "best" (or at least, most expensive) DAC I'd used at the time. However, with continued use, I increasingly found myself turning the volume down when using this DAC for prolonged periods (and I generally prefer pretty modest levels to start with). I came to realize the DAC was giving me listening fatigue. Here's the thread I started on the Emotiva Forums. The DC-1 seemed to enjoy a fair amount of a popularity, and I never saw anyone else complain about listening fatigue with the unit. I initially wanted to do a "listening tour" with it, to see if anyone else had the same effect. But someone contacted me with an offer to buy, and I sold it to him. (He was fully aware of my issue with it, and in fact responded to my listening tour announcement. I let him try it before asking for payment. He didn't report any fatigue, said he loved it.)
Also, before I sold it, I did ship it to Emotiva, and they ran it through their AP machine, and gave me a copy of the report. No anomalies or abnormalities. So as I suggested above, I suspect the "issue" is with my ears. I've been through countless DACs since, and never experienced this. (And FWIW, I find I actually have a preference for old non-oversampling (NOS) DACs, such as the tda1387, which have pretty mediocre measurements by today's standards.)
Just interested if, based on amirm's measurements, anyone has any theories about the DC-1 and/or my hearing which would be more likely to cause listening fatigue?
Also, before I sold it, I did ship it to Emotiva, and they ran it through their AP machine, and gave me a copy of the report. No anomalies or abnormalities. So as I suggested above, I suspect the "issue" is with my ears. I've been through countless DACs since, and never experienced this. (And FWIW, I find I actually have a preference for old non-oversampling (NOS) DACs, such as the tda1387, which have pretty mediocre measurements by today's standards.)
Just interested if, based on amirm's measurements, anyone has any theories about the DC-1 and/or my hearing which would be more likely to cause listening fatigue?
Jimster480
Major Contributor
What DAC do you have now?
What headphones are you using it with?
The fatigue might be a result of the higher level details coming through? I know that many people on headfi describe detailed DAC's as "sharp" or "bright".
I never used it with headphones, as I really only use headphones in a "utilitarian" sense (drown out noise at work, background music on the train, etc).
I chase sound quality with speaker systems. At the time I had the DC-1 (three or four years ago), I had a nearfield speaker setup, using Mark Audio Alpair 7.3-based speakers. My amp was something DIY-ish based on the TPA311x chip. With those speakers and amps, I also used a Gustard DAC-X12, and never had any fatigue. It doesn't look like amirm has measured that particular Gustard DAC, but I would expect it to measure at least as good as the DC-1. I eventually got into the tda1387-based NOS DACs, and have pretty much used those almost exclusively for a couple years or so now. I've used an Allo Boss DAC off and on periodically as well. But I'm also no longer constrained to nearfield, and have even more amps (tpa3251, lm3886, tda8932).
Oh, I also tried an Emotiva XDA-1 in that role too. I've had the XDA-1 since 2011, using it in my living room as a preamp/DAC. It didn't cause the fatigue. And that reminds me, I also put the DC-1 in my living room rig: another tpa311x amp, but Salk Songtower speakers. That setup would also eventually give me fatigue.
(I'm heavily into diyAudio. First tda1387 DAC was this one, which I used/modded for quite a while. For the last year or so, I've been designing my own simplistic tda1387 DACs.)
OP
- Thread Starter
- #49
I get listener fatigue with all gear and all equipment. It is just the brain saying too much music and go do something else.
wadec22
Senior Member
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I don't necessarily agree with listening fatigue being attributed to time spent. I can spend a 12 hour day listening with only restroom and lunch breaks. with headphones - fatigue is usually caused by the frequency response having a peak or two that you are sensitive to (my case with the HD800). With a DAC or AMP change - fatigue is probably because you are not as volume matched as you thought you might have been and are just listening too loud, for too long a time period.
That was my DC-1 Amir measured and I'm still using it, both for my full speaker based playback and as a source for my Sennheiser 650 headphones. Never experienced any "fatigue" attribuable to listening with it over the last 4 years of ownership.
I wouldn't blame your experience on either the DC-1 or your ears. There was nothing in Amir's measurements that would point to any audible problems with the DAC, in fact the results were overall very good, specially in light of some that were examined at later dates. I would blame it on human response to various bias and the fact that once people believe they are hearing something it's very hard to wipe the slate clean. Maybe if you had run some bias controlled blind listening tests between the DC-1 and whatever other DAC you prefer, if you found you could no longer hear that "fatigue" issue, you might be able to relieve yourself of erroneous conclusions.
Fact is that today's properly designed DAC's (and most other source components) are fully transperant and if you are devoted to "chasing sound quality" the most reasonable place to take that journey will be with your speakers.
I get listener fatigue with all gear and all equipment. It is just the brain saying too much music and go do something else.
+1, get a life.
I feel like I inadvertently did that, though. Perhaps not in an explicit, controlled environment, but somewhat implicitly: I bought the device, started using it, and without any external factors that I can determine, increasingly found it uncomfortable. I wanted to like it. And before I went online and started asking about listening fatigue, I did play some swapping games. Yes, they were sighted. But I feel like if I had any bias, it was in favor of the DC-1, being that I just bought it, spent a fair amount of money on it, and was encouraged by near-unanimous positive reviews about it.
I agree. I should say I'm not really chasing sound quality. It would be more apt to say I'm chasing "fun". That's why I'm so much into DIY: if I get a bump in sound quality (real or imagined), that's great; but my main goal is to have fun tinkering and learning. In fact, I fully admit to exploiting the "baby bias" with DIY (I designed/built/modified this, so I enjoy it that much more).
One interesting datum I have observed through the years is that sometimes better systems induce more listener fatigue. This was very counterintuitive to me until I realized that, as my system improved, I was able to play it louder without noticeable distortion. Louder led to more fatigue; my earlier systems would distort and force me to turn it down. So IME/IMO it is not just distortion but also the overall SPL being too high that leads to fatigue.
Probably worth noting again that the oft-cited OSHA guidance for SPL is worthless if you are an audiophile (or musician). The rules are meant to ensure you can have hear conversations when you are 60 (or 40, or whenever), not enjoy nuances in music and such. You can read the info on the OSHA site; it is pretty disheartening for those who want to listen at 100 dB-plus average levels.
Probably worth noting again that the oft-cited OSHA guidance for SPL is worthless if you are an audiophile (or musician). The rules are meant to ensure you can have hear conversations when you are 60 (or 40, or whenever), not enjoy nuances in music and such. You can read the info on the OSHA site; it is pretty disheartening for those who want to listen at 100 dB-plus average levels.
+1. Also IME the more revealing the system, the more the weaknesses of many recordings in my collection were noticed. Only the very best recordings benefited from the extra detail supplied by superior gear.
Maybe it depends on what kind of music you listen to but I usually find the opposite to be true in most cases.
On my Stax, I have to take care to keep myself from letting the volume creep up over time. I attribute this to the lower distortion as the Stax have little to no rising distortion with rising volume at any listenable level.
I also find that all but the most abysmal recordings and mixes usually benefit from better transducers. I mostly listen to metal and even with the DR compressed all to hell on a modern mix there are always extra layers of reverb and overdub or better separation of dueling lead guitars that you can hear on better equipment.
Or maybe it's just preferences, since I'm having a hard time thinking of any track I have from another that I'd rather listen to on my HD650s than my Stax Lambdas. You may hear more problems with more resolving transducers but you also hear more nuances as well.
I remember my email conversations with Jim Salk before I purchased the Songtowers, he told a story about how one of his customers bought one of his higher-end speakers. With the new speakers, he had the music up so loud, he couldn't hear the phone ring. But before the new speakers, he never turned the music up so loud as to drown out the phone ring. Jim was trying to convey this point exactly: less distortion allows for higher volumes.
In my case though, I'm quite certain I wasn't pushing the volume any higher with the DC-1. For one, I regularly took SPL measurements. Granted, this was with free apps on my phone, so probably not too precise. But I think it's good enough to see if I'm improving volume significantly or not. But even more importantly than the SPL meter: the room in which I did my listening shared a wall with my young daughter's bedroom, and most of my listening was done after she went to bed. So even if the smartphone SPL meter app was total bunk, waking up my daughter would have been an obvious indicator that the volume was much louder.
Tatteredmidnight
Active Member
I had an interesting experience along these lines maybe 15 years ago. A friend of mine had picked up a small pair of Genelec active near fields' (4" or 5" I think), and was running them off a MOTU interface he was using on his mixing rig. After less than an hour of listening, we'd routinely find that we had turned the volume down substantially or had to take a listening break.
After a few months, the opportunity to upgrade his interface to an RME Audio Multifaceted presented itself. Immediately, the harsh upper end calmed to the point that we no longer found the experience taxing, even after long sessions.
This was before I was aware (or maybe before this was even a "mainstream" concern) of the DAC wars that we are having now. Because of that, we were caught totally by surprise at the change, expecting a mild increase in SQ at most.
Considering the sensitivity of high quality headphones/monitors these days, I wonder if there may be some very high frequency harmonics or other effects that are contributing to listening fatigue that may not even be audible. Just because we don't hear something doesn't mean there is a no transfer of energy from the mechanical wave to our ears.
After a few months, the opportunity to upgrade his interface to an RME Audio Multifaceted presented itself. Immediately, the harsh upper end calmed to the point that we no longer found the experience taxing, even after long sessions.
This was before I was aware (or maybe before this was even a "mainstream" concern) of the DAC wars that we are having now. Because of that, we were caught totally by surprise at the change, expecting a mild increase in SQ at most.
Considering the sensitivity of high quality headphones/monitors these days, I wonder if there may be some very high frequency harmonics or other effects that are contributing to listening fatigue that may not even be audible. Just because we don't hear something doesn't mean there is a no transfer of energy from the mechanical wave to our ears.
I think this is in agreement with us. As for the rest, I was not making (at least not trying to make) the point that more distortion is in any way shape or form better sound-wise, just that it forces us to turn down the volume.
I didn't take you as saying that. Specifically I disagree with the "Louder led to more fatigue" part. All, else equal it will, but in comparing different systems I find theirindividual qualities are usually more important. Systems with more distortion or issues with peaks and resonances cause me more fatigue than cleaner ones, even when the cleaner system is at a much higher volume.
For me, the volume keeps creeping up because it doesn't cause as much fatigue. With something that I find more fatiguing the volume will usually creep downwards right from the start.
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