New "Science": FLAC vs. WAV

[Thomas savage]

1 minute you are telling everyone to buy a $1895 USB interface because it's great value and your selling it, the next minute the built in USB interface in a $200 DAC is as good as it gets. Then you expect to have credibility after this? Do you really think everyone reading is that stupid?

There is the audiophile part of us, then there is this forums principle of respecting what's known and understood, the things that can be proven.

somtimes this can highlight a contradiction within us, it certainly does within me. It's a perfectly normal state of affairs though and very much part of being human.

 

[Mivera]

There is the audiophile part of us, then there is this forums principle of respecting what's known and understood.. That can be proven.

somtimes this can highlight a contradiction within us, it certainly does with me. It's a perfectly normal state of affairs though and very much part of being human.

Well there's consistency with some, and none with others. Reality should be reality no matter where your financial interest lie. It's starting to be very apparent on forums who has money invested where, and their reality seems to follow this reality rather than the truth.

 

[Thomas savage]

Well there's consistency with some, and none with others. Reality should be reality no matter where your financial interest lie. It's starting to be very apparent on forums who has money invested where, and their reality seems to follow this reality rather than the truth.

Umm... Truth

Problem with truth like yours is every bugger has their own idea of it, this 'idea' is Moulded by ones own intrest, to suit ones narrative.

As a forum we need to be above that, certainly if we want to keep the word 'science ' as part of our title.

 

[Thomas savage]

We can get back to Flac vs Wav now... Next week it's organic carrots vs just carrots

 

[Mivera]

Well I understand what Don is saying, but these isolation measures aren't flawless. They cause drawbacks of their own. The very best way is to avoid the extra noise in the first place. This way the isolation can be minimal. The reason FLAC was created in the first place was to shrink the file size down. It wasn't an audiophile tweak to maximize performance from a system.

 

[Don Hills]

But the problem is still whether that "competent design" has been realised, in the flesh, for the products that apparently show a difference in audible behaviour, for WAV and FLAC. ...

If there's a difference, I don't buy it. Literally. As far as I'm concerned, it's broken.
For example, I'm not going to buy a DAC which requires an external USB decrapifier for it to give of its best.

 

[fas42]

There won't be a difference. So can we move along?

Is this an example of science inquiry ... or perhaps, http://audiosciencereview.com/forum...-science-pseudoscience-and-self-delusion.637/ ...

 

[fas42]

If there's a difference, I don't buy it. Literally. As far as I'm concerned, it's broken.
For example, I'm not going to buy a DAC which requires an external USB decrapifier for it to give of its best.

The point here then is, how do you know that "it's broken" - before you buy it?

 

[Mivera]

If there's a difference, I don't buy it. Literally. As far as I'm concerned, it's broken.
For example, I'm not going to buy a DAC which requires an external USB decrapifier for it to give of its best.

I guess you will be spending a lot of money on a DAC then. Because most have crap USB implementations. Very few are as good as Amir's recommended interface. And that's 2011 technology now.

 

[Mivera]

Great info here on what happens with a general purpose computer CPU with FLAC, and what Dustin Forman the Sabre chip engineer did to overcome the drawback with the Mirus SD card transport:

"Is there any sound quality loss in playing FLAC from an SD card, rather than WAV?

No there is no sound quality loss. The FLAC is decoded into RAM where it becomes normal lossless PCM data, it then is sent to a FIFO for buffering between the RAM and the DAC. Then it is transmitted to the DAC via I2S interface. All this is done for the lowest jitter. The FLAC file is decoded in chucks in a streaming fashion. This is VERY difference from a regular CPU, where the bursty processing can have audible effects. The FLAC decoder is actually a hybrid hardware decoder and software. We did this so the CPU loading is actually very constant (smooth) during the stream decoding. This is only possible since we did not use a general purpose CPU, but rather made a custom decoder in the FPGA to accomplish this. I think the results speak for themselves. I have not heard of one person claiming they can tell the difference on the INVICTA (MIRUS), where its fairly well accepted that on a computer that is decoding on the fly, audible differences can be perceived."

http://www.resonessencelabs.com/invicta/faq/#flacwav

 

[FrantzM]

I wasn't referring to you, I was referring to other members of the peanut gallery with no experience, and just jump on whatever side that's winning at the time.

I don't mind anyone having an opinion. I do when some construct their opinion as facts. You have not provided much more than your or some "Gurus'" opinions so far. We need something more solid. Studies with a modicum of peer review...That's all.

 

[Mivera]

I don't mind anyone having an opinion. I do when some construct their opinion as facts. You have not provided much more than your or some "Gurus'" opinions so far. We need something more solid. Studies with a modicum of peer review...That's all.

What's the difference if you can't hear the difference yourself either way? Are you curious about the sound a tree makes falling in the forest 5 miles away as well? If it was proven by tests you deem acceptable would it automatically start sounding better to you?

 

[Cosmik]

Are there any measurable differences in the signal itself? No, otherwise people wouldn't be paying attention to listening tests. For the experimenters and their apologists to claim to understand how audio works, but also to claim that sonic differences cannot be measured in the signal does not compute. At least one of those two claims is wrong - my money's on both of them.

But here we have a prime example of audio "science" hoist by its own petard. Through the mistaken belief that A/B/X testing is in some way objective, the audio engineering fraternity has effectively signalled that "there may be more to this than just objective measurements of the signal". They can't be surprised if thousands of people who don't understand how engineering works but do understand the basic idea of 'soft' science experiments come along and start investigating audio this way.

Hats off to the experimenters this time with their "height" pseudo-measurement. What could be more objective than reading quality off a tape measure?

 

[March Audio]

It funny how then layman always knows more than the top engineers with over 100 patents. All it takes is following your culture of choice on online forums and you are instantly an audio god.

Again your statement is based on "someone says so". It simply does not follow that they are correct Please provide some evidence that backs up your assertions.

 

[March Audio]

Well I understand what Don is saying, but these isolation measures aren't flawless. They cause drawbacks of their own. The very best way is to avoid the extra noise in the first place. This way the isolation can be minimal. The reason FLAC was created in the first place was to shrink the file size down. It wasn't an audiophile tweak to maximize performance from a system.

Please explain these drawbacks

 

[Mivera]

I have 100 times on this forum already. Listen for yourself and report back.

 

[March Audio]

I have 100 times on this forum already. Listen for yourself and report back.

Please point to where.

Listen to what for what?

 

[March Audio]

I guess you will be spending a lot of money on a DAC then. Because most have crap USB implementations. Very few are as good as Amir's recommended interface. And that's 2011 technology now.

Evidence please.

 

[Thomas savage]

Mikes threshold for eliminating doubt is very low.. thats ok.

Others have low thresholds for establishing a prejudice. .. thats also ok.

Rudemtry practical tests can help but most likely wont tell us all thats going on and can be unhelpful if undertaken with a extrem prejudice towards the results.

Without looking at a system as a whole we are in danger of coming to unsafe conclusions, thats not to say the conclusion will be wrong.

There are plenty of these 'unsafe' conclusions floating about from what i can see.

I appreciate the deep level of understanding donh56 brings to the forum on these matters but if you dont share such a level of understanding ( like me and a lot of others) then one must keep ones veiws in perspective.

 

[March Audio]

Great info here on what happens with a general purpose computer CPU with FLAC, and what Dustin Forman the Sabre chip engineer did to overcome the drawback with the Mirus SD card transport:

"Is there any sound quality loss in playing FLAC from an SD card, rather than WAV?

No there is no sound quality loss. The FLAC is decoded into RAM where it becomes normal lossless PCM data, it then is sent to a FIFO for buffering between the RAM and the DAC. Then it is transmitted to the DAC via I2S interface. All this is done for the lowest jitter. The FLAC file is decoded in chucks in a streaming fashion. This is VERY difference from a regular CPU, where the bursty processing can have audible effects. The FLAC decoder is actually a hybrid hardware decoder and software. We did this so the CPU loading is actually very constant (smooth) during the stream decoding. This is only possible since we did not use a general purpose CPU, but rather made a custom decoder in the FPGA to accomplish this. I think the results speak for themselves. I have not heard of one person claiming they can tell the difference on the INVICTA (MIRUS), where its fairly well accepted that on a computer that is decoding on the fly, audible differences can be perceived."

http://www.resonessencelabs.com/invicta/faq/#flacwav

Sorry but he didnt actually say anything about a PC cpu in this text. Anything that happens in the PC does not automatically equate to a problem after being passed through a USB interface to a DAC. Hasnt this dac buffered and FIFOd the usb derived data?

Also "fairly well accepted" by whom? Audiophiles? That reliable source of objective information?

A quick search revealed this quote

The biggest headline is this: if there were an audible difference between SD card playback and the Antipode DS music server lassoed with Light Harmonic LightSpeed USB cable, I couldn’t pick it.

As you would expect from a competently designed DAC.