While the banter is interesting, RocketScientist's objective (pun intended) shouldn't be misconstrued, or altered after the fact.
I built my O2 mainly for portable use, and RS claimed it couldn't really be made smaller using through-hole (and DIY friendly) parts. In other words, this was part of the design goal.
Some users were disappointed that it wasn't smaller, but it and a digital player together are smaller than the Walkman they've replaced.
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sofaspud said:
in what world is the O2 plus DAP smaller than a walkman? even my old sony tape walkman from 1988 is smaller.
@xnorculture
aah yes this again, all anyone ever needs is the O2 forever more. If that were the case, what the hell are you doing here? didnt you build your rigs a year or 2 ago? or now that the remaining subjectivites are mostly just ignoring your constant posturing, you have to pick on people who insist on even higher objective results than you do and admit they may be overdoing it for intellectual benefit?
forget it opc, counter culture and xnor are definitely part of the Objective killjoy borg.
you see guys, its really not for any user to prove beyond doubt to you what their preference is and why, as long as its stated as such. they do not have any responsibility to do so.
I love how Owens anecdotal results were accepted because they came out with no difference with one of the more benign headphone loads around; a test that is therefor not statistically significant even anecdotally. the burden of proof seems relaxed if it matches the status quo. jh13 performs better with the wire too IME, as does K1000, DT880-990/600Ω, but I have no falsifiable objective proof of that subjective event... I have a feeling you will not accept this?
nevermind that I suspect I could build up a the wire SE-SE seconds PCB, strap 4 x 9v batteries, or a nicely made breadboard bipolar LM317/37 regulator with solid copper foil GND layer to it and still better the O2 objectively, for less money than the O2. the LME parts have come down considerably in price and they have such huge PSRR that you only need to do proper housekeeping on a regular power supply and have a well designed PCB to do well with them.
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Wait!!
It just dawned on me after two delicious Orval beers what is actually going on here.
It's a new subgroup that I didn't think could exist:
"Being objectivist up until the point when it is subjectively determined that there is no longer a need to be objective"
Wow... that's real mind bender.
I'm going to have another beer and mull it over
Cheers,
Owen
It just dawned on me after two delicious Orval beers what is actually going on here.
It's a new subgroup that I didn't think could exist:
"Being objectivist up until the point when it is subjectively determined that there is no longer a need to be objective"
Wow... that's real mind bender.
I'm going to have another beer and mull it over
Cheers,
Owen
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Did you calculate it? I just did, for a Best Buy webstore CD Walkman vs. the B2-080 enclosure. It wasn't even close... Walkman @ 458 cm^3 to the 02 @ 264 cm^3.
My point is only that NwAvGuy was faithful to his stated design goals. If that makes me a fanboy or whatever else, so be it. If your design goals are different than his, the O2 isn't for you. It's really as simple as that.
yep and those design goals contain multiple compromises, that is our point. and none of that has any meaning here in this thread.
is there a better measuring dac and amp than the O2? the answer is a resounding yes and not a small amount better. any other factors you add in, price, size, no SMD, audibility (by your metric), easily build-able by beginners who cannot read a schematic etc... have no meaning
what the hell kind of huge thing is that? thats the most ridiculous sized CD walkman ever, arent we supposed to be comparing like for like here? you also skipped the volume taken up by the DAP and cables with the O2
None? Probably not. But then again I did not bring it up. To repeat, I just responded to what I viewed as a misrepresentation of RS's design goals.
My recollection is that RS even said, in so many words, that The Wire would outperform his O2. No doubt there are many others (and the purpose of the OP).
It's a Sony DEJ011 thing. My DAP is about the size of 2 USB thumbdrives. I'm again skipping the cables.
@qusp: Since you put words in other people's mouths I indeed take your anecdotes (or let's say most of what you say) with a bag of salt.
Never did I say that
I still do plan on building a "The Wire" and comparing it to other amps including the O2.
@opc: No reason to jump on the qusp-train (wreck).
Never did I say that
so stop using such straw man fallacies.
I still do plan on building a "The Wire" and comparing it to other amps including the O2.
@opc: No reason to jump on the qusp-train (wreck).
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Youve demonstrated it and the pack mentality time and time again here and (mostly) on the other forum, I have no need to put words in your mouth.
shall we add stunted objectivist to the list of funny word plays? interesting word combination. there is no bandwagon to jump on, i'm just calling what I see and I expect opc is doing the same. if you dont like the characterization, i'm afraid thats bad luck.
shall we add stunted objectivist to the list of funny word plays? interesting word combination. there is no bandwagon to jump on, i'm just calling what I see and I expect opc is doing the same. if you dont like the characterization, i'm afraid thats bad luck.
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its illustrated by the fact there is only a single person from the O2 fanclub that has shown some initiative to keep building stuff. Even if it is just a projection of what the desktop version might have looked like, he is still to be congratulated. how many years is it now? and the genepool for new designs is stagnant.
the leader has vanished and the crowd is still milling around and many dont seem to know what to do with themselves. fine if you dont feel the need to build more stuff, but its puzzling that so many continue to hang around the singular thread, or others with O2 in the subject, constantly towing the party line by quoting the same studies, quoting the O2 manual/website and persistently questioning any attempt to take objective performance further
the leader has vanished and the crowd is still milling around and many dont seem to know what to do with themselves. fine if you dont feel the need to build more stuff, but its puzzling that so many continue to hang around the singular thread, or others with O2 in the subject, constantly towing the party line by quoting the same studies, quoting the O2 manual/website and persistently questioning any attempt to take objective performance further
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better wake up from that unreality now mate.... the O2/Odac were made available and supported at zero, well actually negative profit, so expecting better for less than nothing?... not going to happen. its completely unsustainable as an enterprise and was only possible due to massive time and money investment by RS.
I feel in this respect has provided its own set of fables/lies/misunderstandings of how the real world actually works. grooming people to believe that a device should cost at or below the some total of its parts cost was somewhat dishonest. the design for the O2/ODAC is not going to be hard to beat and its a high end ESS dac, it will not be a cheap dac, or an SE dac (though perhaps Owen will add SE outs, probably not)
It will have SE outputs, but as a rough idea for pricing, I think the DAC IC alone costs more than the entire Odac does, so it certainly won't be cheaper.
If you are working on a tight budget, you'll be hard pressed to get more value than what RS has offered with Odac.
As I've mentioned before, I enjoy the design challenges of trying to make a piece of equipment that has the best possible objective performance first and foremost. I find it's a lot of fun, and really pushes the bounds of the designer as there are no excuses.
Designing for cost and size are far less fun for me, possibly because that's what I do for a day job
I suppose you could call the audio hobby my escape...
Cheers,
Owen
If you are working on a tight budget, you'll be hard pressed to get more value than what RS has offered with Odac.
As I've mentioned before, I enjoy the design challenges of trying to make a piece of equipment that has the best possible objective performance first and foremost. I find it's a lot of fun, and really pushes the bounds of the designer as there are no excuses.
Designing for cost and size are far less fun for me, possibly because that's what I do for a day job
I suppose you could call the audio hobby my escape...
Cheers,
Owen
OPC
What your position boils down to is this:-
'As long as there remains one person in the world untested, there remains the possibility that he will be able to tell the difference between my amp and the O2.'
This is sophistry, and morally bankrupt sophistry at that.
We all know that you certainly do not use such logic in the course of making life-critical decisions.
You do yourself no credit by employing such arguments, and you will find that principled people will start to eschew your designs if you persist in doing so.
What your position boils down to is this:-
'As long as there remains one person in the world untested, there remains the possibility that he will be able to tell the difference between my amp and the O2.'
This is sophistry, and morally bankrupt sophistry at that.
We all know that you certainly do not use such logic in the course of making life-critical decisions.
You do yourself no credit by employing such arguments, and you will find that principled people will start to eschew your designs if you persist in doing so.
Ugh... not this again.
No... that's not my position. I think you're deriving that from my anecdote, but I'm not really sure.
My position is that what a person can and cannot hear is not a simple matter, and not something I'm comfortable commenting on because I only know of my own personal experience. I'm also suggesting that the same applies to you and your experience.
Can you answer the following for me?
- What is the threshold of audibility for harmonic distortion?
- What is the threshold of audibility for phase deviation?
- What is the threshold of audibility for frequency deviation?
- What is the threshold of audibility for crosstalk?
- What is the threshold of audibility for IM distortion
- What is the threshold of audibility for channel deviation
- What is the threshold of audibility for all the above in conjunction with one another?
I don't think you can put hard numbers to any of the above. Even if you could, they would at best be numbers that represent what a specific person or subgroup of people can hear. They can never be absolute.
Because of that, I don't like to take part in any discussion that delves into the topic of audibility, because I have nothing to offer in terms of proof. That's why we have ridiculous threads about the audibility of wire that are far more popular than the many technically relevant threads on this site.
What I do have a problem with is things like the attached chart from the O2 website.
This chart pits the O2 up against a few other random headphone amps and decrees that it is an "excellent" amplifier based on what I'm guessing is relative technical merit. If you added The Wire to this list, I suppose it would be "Super Duper Excellent", or perhaps it starts sliding down the other side of the mountain into the "A little too excellent" domain.
Where do you draw the line though? I would argue (and I took part in an actual test involving more than a handful of people) that your average person cannot reliably discern crosstalk as long as it's better than 35dB separation. Based on that, all the amplifiers on the list should get a score of "excellent" since they all exceed the limit by a significant margin.
I was never told what my score was on the test, but I can tell you that there was very significant deviation from person to person. That leaves a lot of questions unanswered.
So... what it boils down to is this:
I will continue to strive for the best possible objective performance in everything I design, because for me, that is the best we've got. I will never strive for a "good enough" final product because "good enough" is still a moving target.
The attached list is actually very useful, but the qualifying words after each measurement have no place in an objective evaluation, because they have no objective scientific merit. How can you scientifically show that 40dB of crosstalk is "poor" but 63db is "excellent"? What are the intermediate levels of "fair", "good", and "very good"? How do they relate to audibility?
If I were to publish a list like this, it would just have the numbers on it. It's up to the end user to determine what they feel is important, and just how much of it they want
Cheers,
Owen
No... that's not my position. I think you're deriving that from my anecdote, but I'm not really sure.
My position is that what a person can and cannot hear is not a simple matter, and not something I'm comfortable commenting on because I only know of my own personal experience. I'm also suggesting that the same applies to you and your experience.
Can you answer the following for me?
- What is the threshold of audibility for harmonic distortion?
- What is the threshold of audibility for phase deviation?
- What is the threshold of audibility for frequency deviation?
- What is the threshold of audibility for crosstalk?
- What is the threshold of audibility for IM distortion
- What is the threshold of audibility for channel deviation
- What is the threshold of audibility for all the above in conjunction with one another?
I don't think you can put hard numbers to any of the above. Even if you could, they would at best be numbers that represent what a specific person or subgroup of people can hear. They can never be absolute.
Because of that, I don't like to take part in any discussion that delves into the topic of audibility, because I have nothing to offer in terms of proof. That's why we have ridiculous threads about the audibility of wire that are far more popular than the many technically relevant threads on this site.
What I do have a problem with is things like the attached chart from the O2 website.
This chart pits the O2 up against a few other random headphone amps and decrees that it is an "excellent" amplifier based on what I'm guessing is relative technical merit. If you added The Wire to this list, I suppose it would be "Super Duper Excellent", or perhaps it starts sliding down the other side of the mountain into the "A little too excellent" domain.
Where do you draw the line though? I would argue (and I took part in an actual test involving more than a handful of people) that your average person cannot reliably discern crosstalk as long as it's better than 35dB separation. Based on that, all the amplifiers on the list should get a score of "excellent" since they all exceed the limit by a significant margin.
I was never told what my score was on the test, but I can tell you that there was very significant deviation from person to person. That leaves a lot of questions unanswered.
So... what it boils down to is this:
I will continue to strive for the best possible objective performance in everything I design, because for me, that is the best we've got. I will never strive for a "good enough" final product because "good enough" is still a moving target.
The attached list is actually very useful, but the qualifying words after each measurement have no place in an objective evaluation, because they have no objective scientific merit. How can you scientifically show that 40dB of crosstalk is "poor" but 63db is "excellent"? What are the intermediate levels of "fair", "good", and "very good"? How do they relate to audibility?
If I were to publish a list like this, it would just have the numbers on it. It's up to the end user to determine what they feel is important, and just how much of it they want
Cheers,
Owen
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He didnt... he specifically didnt
you are rearranging the words and their meanings in your head so to be able to disagree with it more readily
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