tili
Member
thank you for the perfect summary above, couldn’t have said it better.
I think it's the result of a technology that has reached perfection. Digital audio is perfect in performance terms (check out the measurements of competent DACs compared to any rival technology: vinyl, r-to-r, etc.). And it is also perfect in terms of cost, size, weight, energy consumption, maintenance requirements, etc.
It has reached the point where the best performance possible is almost free in terms of cost. So where else has it to go?
- Disillusionment when perfect audio played over an amp and passive speakers sounds just like recorded music. Shouldn't it be, like, orgasmic?
- Expectation bias where perceived sound resembles the technology: low cost, light weight, made of plastic
- 'Audiophile grade' housings to add weight and cost and thereby improve the perceived sound. Ten thousand dollars-worth, say.
- Superstition and rumours about bad sound that doesn't show up in measurements
- Alternative 'retro' technology that can be investigated at the competence level of garage-based companies: changes to the filter; use of 'classic' DAC chips.
- The 'audiophile-grade' company that sells its stuff for $500 - much cheaper than $10,000 so brilliant value!
Good question, if folks want to mull it over create a new thread.Maybe off-topic, so you’re warned...
Next step will be amplifiers. Even Benchmark claim that tuning of a specific amp technology is a must when playing back hi-res content.
Many on this forum claim class D is deficient technology.
Are amps really still in its infancy?
Am a big believer in open, civilized discussion on claims/counterclaims, etc. and assume other folks have a similar belief until they prove otherwise. With that in mind, I thought that your post on Jason Stoddard's Head-Fi thread and Jason's suggestion to engage directly with Mike Moffat on his thread would open up an interesting dialogue between you and MikeM. However, that hasn't transpired...hopefully it still will.
Okay. Here’s the thing that started this whole chapter. Mike’s already written about this on his blog, but here’s the summary: a couple of years ago, someone got their nose out of joint about a “glitch” the Yggdrasil exhibited around zero-crossing. We’re talking stuff that’s 120dB down. This is despite AtomicBob measuring the Yggy (showing the glitch) and being unperturbed. But this dood was super-emphatic about being able to “hear the glitch.” He went on and on and on and on about it.
@amirm
New here..saw your post on Head-Fi. Own a variety of gear including several dacs from 'lowly' Fiio's to Sony to iFi Audio to lower-end / mid-level Schiit (yes...even a Bifrost multibit...aka Bimby).
So...I bought the Bimby because it was the complimentary dac (i.e looked nice as a stack) to go with my Valhalla 2 OTL amp for my Senns & Beyers. Thought about getting the DS version to save a few bucks but decided to see what the fuss was about MB dacs. It sounds fine to my ears and is upgradeable...no buyer's remorse here. That said, I also like my ifi Audio dac/amp system for it's chosen use case at roughly half the price.
Am a big believer in open, civilized discussion on claims/counterclaims, etc. and assume other folks have a similar belief until they prove otherwise. With that in mind, I thought that your post on Jason Stoddard's Head-Fi thread and Jason's suggestion to engage directly with Mike Moffat on his thread would open up an interesting dialogue between you and MikeM. However, that hasn't transpired...hopefully it still will.
Given that, a question that seems unresolved (unless I missed it) is that Schiit claims the glitch was fixed (even though it was inaudible to their ears)...see Jason's Head-Fi excerpt below (dated Oct 18 2017).
Thanks in advance for your reply!
- So...my first question would be is the Bimby measured a current one (i.e. post-April 2016 if I counted back correctly)?
- If yes, then is this an audible difference?
- If yes to both of the above, then doesn't it make sense to engage with Mike in his thread?
Jason's Excerpt:
Case the second: the glitch fix. Okay. Here’s the thing that started this whole chapter. Mike’s already written about this on his blog, but here’s the summary: a couple of years ago, someone got their nose out of joint about a “glitch” the Yggdrasil exhibited around zero-crossing. We’re talking stuff that’s 120dB down. This is despite AtomicBob measuring the Yggy (showing the glitch) and being unperturbed. But this dood was super-emphatic about being able to “hear the glitch.” He went on and on and on and on about it.
Aside: and this is how internet memes get started—one guy gets a bit, ah, obsessed, and spreads his views far and wide, far and wide, and spends all his time online defending them, because, you know, that’s what matters, not family or fun or friends or actually engaging in a productive debate where you learn something, and then someone who searches for the product gets Google barfing up all his words on the screen, because he wrote far and wide on the subject, he must be an expert. Shoot me now.
Mike and Dave and I kinda looked at each other and shrugged when we learned about it, because we all knew about “the glitch” and had discussed it during development, eventually deciding just to leave it alone, because it didn’t have any audible consequences.
But this guy kept going. And going. And going and going and going (Note to other sites: this is what moderation is for.)
Finally, Dave says, “Well, we can fix the glitch. It’s just a ROM change.”
Mike, who by now is weary of reading about his “incompetence,” says, “Yeah, **** it, go ahead, let’s compare the two ROMs again and see if there’s any difference.”
So he did. And we compared. There was no sonic difference, just as there hadn’t been any difference during development. No big shock.
“So what do we do now?” Dave asked.
“**** it, put in the glitch fix in all current production.”
“For Yggy?”
“For everything—Yggy, Gumby, Bimby,” Mike said, waving a hand.
“And tell people about it, for an upgrade?” I asked, a little nervously. It was a bit early in the production cycle to change Yggy, and Gumby was really, really new, and Bifrost Multibit had just started shipping.
Mike paused, then grinned. “No. Let someone measure it, like, a year from now, and find out it has no glitch.”
“So never tell them?”
Mike shrugged. “Tell them in a year. Or two.”
I nodded. It really didn’t matter. It didn’t sound any different, so why call attention to it? It would be like admitting the glitch was bad, if we responded to this one crazy guy.
So we applied the deglitchified ROMs and shut up.
That is, until some crazy rumors about upgrades to our multibit DACs started circulating early this month. That’s when Mike had to step in and say, “Yeah, it’s a terrible conspiracy, we made a change 18 months ago that makes your DACs measure better, but not sound any better in any way.”
Why would I get the Schiit Bitfrost MB with it's channel imbalance, it's non-linearity, it's distortion profile, it's lack of jitter suppression vs another DAC that exhibits none of this?
Shoot. I woke up wanting to make this point and you stole my words!The audibility of individual problems might have been interesting to discuss if this dac was exceptionally good in other ways. But this dac is poor across many metrics and doesn't seem to have any potentially redeeming qualities. I think we really have to reckon with the fact that schiit was knowingly selling poor performing dacs because they were confident in their ability to market multibit technology.
I read that as spin from Jason. It doesn't matter either way.
If you buy based on measurements you wouldn't buy it and wouldn't recommend others to. But to some all they care about is how they believe it sounds. You aren't going to change their minds and they've been primed by the marketing already.
First, a warm welcome to the forum.@amirm
New here..saw your post on Head-Fi. Own a variety of gear including several dacs from 'lowly' Fiio's to Sony to iFi Audio to lower-end / mid-level Schiit (yes...even a Bifrost multibit...aka Bimby).
So...I bought the Bimby because it was the complimentary dac (i.e looked nice as a stack) to go with my Valhalla 2 OTL amp for my Senns & Beyers. Thought about getting the DS version to save a few bucks but decided to see what the fuss was about MB dacs. It sounds fine to my ears and is upgradeable...no buyer's remorse here. That said, I also like my ifi Audio dac/amp system for it's chosen use case at roughly half the price.
Am a big believer in open, civilized discussion on claims/counterclaims, etc. and assume other folks have a similar belief until they prove otherwise. With that in mind, I thought that your post on Jason Stoddard's Head-Fi thread and Jason's suggestion to engage directly with Mike Moffat on his thread would open up an interesting dialogue between you and MikeM. However, that hasn't transpired...hopefully it still will.
I love to see them compare their DAC against another blind and see if they can tell that difference. I am sure they would fail that just the same -- multibit or not!Mike, who by now is weary of reading about his “incompetence,” says, “Yeah, **** it, go ahead, let’s compare the two ROMs again and see if there’s any difference.”
So he did. And we compared. There was no sonic difference, just as there hadn’t been any difference during development. No big shock.
Ah you know buddy, that's some special magical parameter we don't know how to measure yet.It is strange that they sell DACs on the very concept of every one sounding different yet all of a sudden they could not hear changes to the distortion characteristics of the DAC? If that is inaudible, how about the rest of the differences?
Ah! the magical parameter we haven't learned to measure yet...Ah you know buddy, that's some special magical parameter we don't know how to measure yet.
It all depends on which magic dust has been sprinkled on the device. Some magic dust is pricier than others you understand.
In a bigger context, isn’t this story a bit symptomatic of contemporary American marketing? I.e. more marketing, less user value in a «rational» sense». This is the American way, isn’t it? Value is in the eye of the beholder.
This is the American way, isn’t it?