It need to be impressed on ASR readers, (once again), that many reviewers and many audiophile listeners LIKE 2nd and 3rd order distortion -- they like components like the Musical Fidelity not despite but because of their relatively high distortion.
Personally I am not such a listener, but -- I wonder -- whether the type as well as magnitude of distortions ought to be taken into account with deference to the above category of listeners?
My mind wanders back once in a while to Amir's review of the Audio Research D300 power amp which had quite high 2nd order, (especially), and 3rd order distortion yet relatively little higher order distortions. Does ARC know something we don't or won't acknowledge???
The distortion products of this DAC are not audible. The most prominent harmonic is the third, and it is at -100db.
Imagine someone speaking to you from 1 meter away. Now imagine they walk away from you so that they are around 60 miles away. Can you hear them speaking? That's how quiet -100db is.
The great deception of DAC manufacturers is that due to some mystical expertise, their dacs are somehow better than other dacs. ASR has done an admirable job dispelling this mysticism. The great deception of the ASR dac reviews is that the difference between the DACs is actually audible. You will notice that almost none of the DAC reviews on this website have listening impressions, unlike tests for amplifiers, headphones and speakers.