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Serious Question: How can DAC's have a SOUND SIGNATURE if they measure as transparent? Are that many confused?

Fluffy

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I know a guy who is just like that. He has some boutique hand-made DAC from the Netherlands that he swears sounds better than anything else, and attribute that to some arbitrary engineering approach by its maker (like separate the amp unit from the dac unit and connect them externally with rca cables… right…). We tried to do some blind testing to see if he or me can tell the difference from other dacs, and although we could in some cases, I don't consider what we did any close to statistically valid, so it proves nothing.

Most of the time I question whether the difference he hears is real or psychological, and he in turn says I don't have enough training to hear what he hears. It's mostly harmless teasing and nobody takes it to heart.

But there is something he does that disturbs me – he often recommends rare and pricey products to people who ask what they should buy. For example, if someone is interested in a DAC at a specific budget, he will try to convince them to get a more expansive DAC because it "sounds better", regardless if it really has the features they need. And of course he doesn't really care about measurements or even how specs correlate to sound. And it's almost redundant to mention at this point that he is also a great believer in the sound of cables and also tried to convince me to buy some expansive cable for their sound…

When he does that it really drives me nuts. And worst of all he recently started importing audiophile audio equipment, meaning that now he also has money incentive to persuade people to buy a more expansive product because it has a subjectively better sound.

I think overall if someone wants to believe a DAC or a cable sounds better, it's his right and his money and he can do whatever he likes. But the moral line is crossed once you try to convince someone to spend more money than needed based on your false beliefs.
 

RayDunzl

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Uh-huh.
 

solderdude

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I think overall if someone wants to believe a DAC or a cable sounds better, it's his right and his money and he can do whatever he likes. But the moral line is crossed once you try to convince someone to spend more money than needed based on your false beliefs.

Consider the following.
The guy who wants advise asks you... you tell him: Buy a cheap one that looks good and does what you want it to do. They all sound the same.

Then he asks the guy owning expensive stuff and telling everyone they hear differences, worthwhile differences and that he knows what sounds good.
He gets a recommendation to buy this, or that one and claims it sounds the best and falls in his budget.

Who is the potential buyer inclined to believe most. Does he want cheap functionality or the 'best sound' ?

What if the person giving the advice to buy certain expensive stuff is convinced he is telling the absolute truth ? What if he is acting in good faith but, in reality is telling porkies but is convinced he is not... he is genuine in his belief.
Could one call someone like that morally dishonest and giving tips based on false beliefs ?

Nah... if someone asks you for advice you give your most honest advise.
If someone asks someone else for advice I would think they too give their most honest advise.
It could be different if the one giving advise gives someone an incorrect advice because he gains something by this. This I would call crossing a moral line when the one handing out advice is giving the wrong one for other reasons than having the best in mind for the one that asks.

(P.S. I hope I have my advice and advise's correct)
 

Fluffy

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When a person convinces someone to spend more money (or any form of resource for that matter) than necessary based on "believe me", it's dishonest, and it doesn't matter how much faith he has in his belief. Personally I try to always add "you should hear and decide for yourself" to any recommendation I make. I never claim to know what sounds best just based on experience and without explaining exactly what is the material benefit. And if I can't explain what makes something better than another thing, I just don't claim it does.

The guy I was talking about, for example, suggested I buy a Cardas cable for my headphones. He says it sounds better to him, using the regular vague audiophile terms, but can't explain why should it work better. When I listened for myself and of course noticed no difference, he made up the usual excuses like I need to be concentrated and learn how to spot the difference and it depends on how tired I am etc. I believe him that he genuinely believes that he can hear the difference, but the problem is that he is unaware of his biases. And by trying to convince me to buy it he is not selling me the cable, but his own biases.

So, if someone can't be bothered to check his own biases, I don't consider him honest.
 

solderdude

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So, if someone can't be bothered to check his own biases, I don't consider him honest.

I would call him 'firmly rooted' in his (erroneous) beliefs and mistaken. You don't have to take his advice nor does he have to take yours.
To me the guy is an idiot ... errm a misguided person giving poor advice.
The one taking it is gullible and probably doesn't know any better. Serves him right to not investigate himself and costing hem more than needed.

To me dishonest would be if he actually knew better and gave wrong advice on purpose or for financial or other gains to himself.
 

BDWoody

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So, if someone can't be bothered to check his own biases, I don't consider him honest.

It seems many believe that potential bias is just one thing, is easily identified, and can simply be dismissed as irrelevant because they can then just reason through it, rather than control for it.

"How could I have been biased if I didn't even expect it to do well?" or some variation on that theme.

Wrong, of course, but you start getting into all that and they stop hearing anything but blah blah blah after they hear .1db level matching...
 

Sal1950

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Then he asks the guy owning expensive stuff and telling everyone they hear differences, worthwhile differences and that he knows what sounds good.
He gets a recommendation to buy this, or that one and claims it sounds the best and falls in his budget.

Who is the potential buyer inclined to believe most. Does he want cheap functionality or the 'best sound' ?
That right there is the reason for the success of the wild and crazy world of High End audio. It's just human nature to believe that so many of these fully transparent conponents can sound different from one another. And the moneys spent on a very expensive audio shrine will impress the friends. ;)
 

BDWoody

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@JJB70 has got the most appropriate noun to define DACs: commodity.

Nothing more nothing less than sugar, olive oils, coffee, copper, and so on ...

And this is why the 'high end' can never admit any of this. Commodity pricing vs Premium product pricing. Profit on that $6k magic DAC may be 50-100 times more than one priced as part of the commodity market.

They don't need many suckers...

Then there is the crime of audio cable nonsense...
 

Snarfie

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Can you speak about a specific sound signature for a DAC if everyting around the DAC as the analog filter determening the sound for a big part.
Enclosed My Philips CD CD630 with a seperate JK Acoustic Analog CD filter (on top picture) with uncompromised electronic parts compared to the cheap filter of Philips C630. Listning to Miles Davis the JK filter produced considerble less listning fatigue. For the rest sound was more ore less the same.
wTlHMhy.jpg
 
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BDWoody

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Can you speak about a specific sound signature for a DAC if everyting around the DAC as the analog filter determening the sound for a big part.
Enclosed My Philips CD CD630 with a seperate JK Acoustic Analog CD filter (on top picture) whith uncompromised electronic parts compared with the cheap filter of Philips CD360. Listning to Miles Davis the JK filter produced considerble less listning fatigue sound was more ore less the same.
wTlHMhy.jpg

How did you determine these differences? What does less fatigued mean?

This is basically what this thread is about... Are you open to the idea that these differences may not exist? The only way to really know would be to control the listening exercise...
 

Purité Audio

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They are ‘supporting the industry’ and if they stay engaged there is a chance, slim admittedly that in time some of them will actually learn something.
Keith
 

Wombat

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Sometimes, after reading subjectively opinionated posts on this forum I can't be bothered listening to the music. Mentally fatigued. :rolleyes:
 

Snarfie

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How did you determine these differences? What does less fatigued mean?

What i notice is quite subjective i guess to star with. But i alway's had the problem in the late 80ties with CD's (compared to vinyl) that CD's sounded in the higher freq regions quite harsch esspecialy with Miles Davis trumpet.. After 30 minutes or so i was more ore less getting tired listning to Tutu Amandla for instance. When using the JK filter (by the way also a Dutch design) the sharp edgeg where gone i could listen for hours. The JK filter was more ore less getting ride of the sharp edge is my (subjective) impression.



This is basically what this thread is about... Are you open to the idea that these differences may not exist? The only way to really know would be to control the listening exercise...
What i aming at is that the electronics an design around a DAC is also determinening it sound signature. So i guess that the same DAC sounds differently when using a different electronic design and or used more quality componenets. So it is not only controling the listning exercise but also the used components i guess. Thats why i like ASR the measure only the output of the whole device. An it looks like that the DAC's making use of the most elegant electronic designs and used components scores the best. So i bought the Topping D10. But if you ask me is there s hughe difference to be noticed between the Philips CD630 an topping D10 no it is quite subtle hard to notice. But the difference between my laptop DAC an those 2 is quite noticeable (air between instruments an voices & channel seperation).
 
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BDWoody

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What i aming at is that the electronics en design around a DAC is also determinening it sound signature. So i guess that the same DAC sounds differently when using a different electronic design and or used componenets. So it is not only controling the listning exercise but also the used components i guess. Thats why i like ASR the measure only the output of the whole device. An it looks like that the DAC's making use of the most elegant electronic disigns and used components scores the best. So i bought the Topping D10. But if you ask me is there i hudge difference to be noticed between the Philips CD630 an topping D10 no it is quite subtle hard to notice. But the difference between my laptop DAC an those 2 is quite noticeable (air between instruments an voices & channel seperation).

So, once again:

This is basically what this thread is about... Are you open to the idea that these differences may not exist? The only way to really know would be to control the listening exercise...
 

Snarfie

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So, once again:

This is basically what this thread is about... Are you open to the idea that these differences may not exist? The only way to really know would be to control the listening exercise...
yes i'm open to the idea that there is no big difference between DAC's at least not realy noticeble or even absent. But the point is you can't listen to a DAC only you need to take in consideration te used component like opamps electronic design etc. when listning to a DAC. 70% what my sound determines is my room accoustics not my DAC cables etc etc.
 
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Fluffy

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It's not necessarily that there is no difference (but it could be), it could also be that there is a difference that can be attributed to something specific through measurement. Channel separation could come down to crosstalk and a very poor implementation may be audible. "Air between instruments" is quite vague, and there are numerous possible explanations to that kind of feeling. Or of course it could be just bias. If the output signal is identical as far as audibly relevant, then the difference is purely psychological.
 

Snarfie

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It's not necessarily that there is no difference (but it could be), it could also be that there is a difference that can be attributed to something specific through measurement. Channel separation could come down to crosstalk and a very poor implementation may be audible. "Air between instruments" is quite vague, and there are numerous possible explanations to that kind of feeling. Or of course it could be just bias. If the output signal is identical as far as audibly relevant, then the difference is purely psychological.
The only real difference that I can notice immediately is making use of propper room correction soft or hardware.
 
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Frank Dernie

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I know there are people out there that think cables affect sound, which is much worse, but there really is no response to something like that, but just to smile and nod. But what about people who talk about DACS as if they were headphone drivers or speakers, and talk about the SOUNDSTAGE, IMAGING, and MIDRANGE of a DAC? I actually don't know what to say to people to not be rude. If you try explaining that a DAC isn't something that actually changes the sound, they accuse you of having "a hard-on for measurements", as if it were the measurements themselves that tell you that DACs don't have a sound. What they don't get though, is that even if we had no equipment to measure distortion or other aspects of sound, still would not have a sound to them. So you try explaining by telling them that when you listen to different DACs using the same headphone and amp, that you cannot tell the difference. "You can't tell the difference between DACS????" "There must be something wrong with your system. You don't have revealing enough upstream and downstream equipment. Either that you haven't "learned" to tell the difference between them." Then you explain that in double-blind studies people are not able to tell the difference between Dacs any better than someone picking random answers. And their response is that the differences are "subtle", and them and other audiophiles who have spent time practicing and learning how to listen properly can hear a difference. "That doesn't sound like a very good way of testing that. Just taking a random group of people who know nothing about audio equipment and asking them to try to find the difference between DACs? Those people haven't yet learned to know the difference!" Then you ask them how they know that they actually hear the difference and it isn't just placebo. ETC.

The problem is that this isn't even an uncommon view. I would say that people who understand there isn't a difference between decently engineered dac (except perhaps small amounts of distortion in the lower end ones that may or may not be audible). Most audiophiles think there is at least a subtle difference between DACS and don't realize that saying the DACS sound different is like saying the portion of a DVD player that takes the 0s and 1s that are read off the disk and converts them into video can make the same DVD "look different" on the same exact TV. It's incredible, but if you want to be friends with audiophiles or even post on an audiophile board, you either have to pretend you agree or somehow remain silent when people talk about this stuff. Like "ohh have you heard the utopias in the chord hugo?? it really makes the mids stand out, but its a warmer dac". The main problem is actually that there is a confusion. They think that we mean that what makes a DAC "objectively good" is a TRANSPARENT DAC, and that we first define a good dac as a transparent DAC and then say that the measurements prove that the DAC is transparent, and therefore it is the better DAC. They think there are other dacs that are not transparent, but rather, color the sound in a good way, and therefore "measure worse" but sound better. This is nothing but a huge confusion. If that were how dacs worked, then I would actually agree with them. What matters most is how something sounds. However that is literally not what DACS do. DACs by nature do not have a sound signature. Saying a DAC has a sound signature is like saying a cable has a sound signature (well I guess if it is a really ****** dac it can have a sound signature of "fuzzy" or whatever dac distortion is, but you get the picture). Problem is, I don't think there will ever be an easy way to educate audiophiles about this, and so the only remedy will be like who the hell knows?
I tend not to discuss it.
People seem reluctant to accept a change of opinion.
If asked I explain I did some level matched comparisons years ago and have an opinion I am comfortable with based on the data I have.
If somebody disagrees I leave then to it, most people I know resent any questioning of a strongly held opinion, even when backed up by convincing data so discussion tends to result in more heat than light.
 
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