You are right -- free markets, corporations, economic theory, etc....
You are still right -- even free speech having nothing to do with technology has proven this to be true.
Not sure about this one, but I am sure you will be proven wrong somehow
.New here but long time viewer.
The DAC chip doesn't mean little unless you have it surrounded with the right components.
But it is good for thebrich guys to get s@ckered into buying these as they do help a lot of audio companies R&D less expensive components. I'd take one for free and sell it and buy a Weiss and EAR Integrated.
The DAC chip doesn't mean little unless you have it surrounded with the right components.
But it is good for thebrich guys to get s@ckered into buying these as they do help a lot of audio companies R&D less expensive components. I'd take one for free and sell it and buy a Weiss and EAR Integrated.
irrelevance to DIYA i'll give you
it is an unfortunate problem with the free market that you can just make up ******** and lies to baffle and bamboozle those without the sense of reason to see through it, con them out of their money as a conman would, which IS illegal. but hey we're used to that in all fields, not just audio.
When i'm selling more subjectively leaning products I try not to make technical claims of superiority I cant back up. if you dont do that then hey i'm all good, they can charge what they like.
with this sort of coin, at least buy an Accuphase DC901/D900 (theres your truly high end and high priced ESS dac fast42), at least then you get a transport with some substance and a substantial chassis, not a cheap plastic trayed oppo in a crass case, with an MCU that doesnt seem to always know what samplerate its playing and a 60lb digital stack that still somehow doesnt have enough heatsink to put in a cabinet and a 5k power supply upgrade that produces enough noise that it can be seen in measures of the dac above it....
save the 10k on the clock and buy a nice set of speakers.
fast42: with all the fuss you are making about PSRR over in Scott's Discrete opamp thread i've gotta say i'm surprised at your 'good enough' comments re the PSU, or the blind faith you are showing for a device you havent heard because of some paid reviews and a price tag.
another ESS worth a mention aside from DIY ones is the 7kUSD Calyx FemtoDAC, which seems to be gaining a rep as a bit of a giant killer
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Will have a look ...
The proof's in the pudding, so to speak. The SW-OPA needs to be as good as it can possibly be, so that it can be used anywhere, in any situation, that's a decent aim for such an exercise. It's worth going to some effort to get things as "right" as they possibly they can be at the design stage, when it's the least headache trying to compensate for less than best performance.
So, with the msb, they've focused on areas which have given the best subjective results, and if that's meant less than technically perfect power supplies that's not really important, because it apparently doesn't affect the sound quality. Technical perfection doesn't guarantee "perfect" sound, and I have heard extremely convincing sound from gear that's way short of being "correct".
In simple terms, get something technically as good as you can as a first stage, and if that doesn't do the job for sound quality then you have to pull out your bag of dark arts tricks to get the extra performance. No-one, no matter what they say, at this moment really understands everything that matters for getting top notch sound, and that's just the way it is ...
As for accepting the reports of the msb performance, I've been reading reviews for over 25 years and I can pretty well most times read between the lines, I look for certain key phrases, and the types of reactions of the listeners, to pick whether there is special merit in the component.
Frank
and here's another commercial ESS dac with similar jitter specs and even cheaper price tag
Anedio Affordable High-End Audio : High-end USB audio DAC based on ESS Technologies' 32-bit ES9018 DACcounter culture, I am not defending the product, but merely defending anything like it. Whether it be over-the-counter drugs (does Echinisia and Cherry extract really work?), cars, running shoes (I think that the kids call them "kicks" nowadays -- whatever the heck that means...), diy audio components, clothing, houses, or audio/video products with more blinky lights than the last version, if there is a free market and there are people willing to purchase a product, then let them.
I am merely defending the game. The game has been going to go on longer than I have ever be here on this planet.
Now, what I don't like too much is the consumerism behind it all. But that is up to the wise man to figure out. Consumption used to be driven by what you need and how you could go about working those hours to make that much money to afford that new item. Now consumerism is driven by a display social status rather than any intrinsic utility of those goods. If those people want to pay that much for maybe what amounts to snake oil, then sure, go ahead I say. The information is out there for the wise man to make an informed choice because maybe if you compare or look at several other manufacturers, you might pick up that they push different criteria, and critical thinking will hopefully help you realize that the electroplated gold on that XLR interconnect is really only adding a sixty-cent value and a nice sheen.
And then there are wise men out there that completely skip the critical thinking process -- maybe it is the bombardment of advertising, fashion magazines, Amway testimonials, "reality" television stars, and the belief of being told that, "if you have this, you have made it in life". Face it, the things like this are excellently hyped (from DACs to running shoes). Look at what they push as various criterias for excellence, and even a smart man might completely forget that any other criteria exist. It is hypnotic and they believe the hype.
Maybe it sounds good to their own ears, better than their last DAC. Things like these are subjective.
Or maybe the wise man with the means who can buy one for every room in his house, also doesn't want to agonize over which DAC they want to get since they're essentially just sand ("sand", hehe, gotta love it), and the value they assign to them is not comparable to the worth of their production. They just buy it.
But it is a fight to know that value of what you are paying for.
tl;dr -- the product is there, I couldn't care less it being there or other liking it, but defend the right to sell it and the right to buy it (it doesn't shoot lasers at kittens does it?), and explain why a wiser man than me might also purchase one or more.
I am merely defending the game. The game has been going to go on longer than I have ever be here on this planet.
Now, what I don't like too much is the consumerism behind it all. But that is up to the wise man to figure out. Consumption used to be driven by what you need and how you could go about working those hours to make that much money to afford that new item. Now consumerism is driven by a display social status rather than any intrinsic utility of those goods. If those people want to pay that much for maybe what amounts to snake oil, then sure, go ahead I say. The information is out there for the wise man to make an informed choice because maybe if you compare or look at several other manufacturers, you might pick up that they push different criteria, and critical thinking will hopefully help you realize that the electroplated gold on that XLR interconnect is really only adding a sixty-cent value and a nice sheen.
And then there are wise men out there that completely skip the critical thinking process -- maybe it is the bombardment of advertising, fashion magazines, Amway testimonials, "reality" television stars, and the belief of being told that, "if you have this, you have made it in life". Face it, the things like this are excellently hyped (from DACs to running shoes). Look at what they push as various criterias for excellence, and even a smart man might completely forget that any other criteria exist. It is hypnotic and they believe the hype.
Maybe it sounds good to their own ears, better than their last DAC. Things like these are subjective.
Or maybe the wise man with the means who can buy one for every room in his house, also doesn't want to agonize over which DAC they want to get since they're essentially just sand ("sand", hehe, gotta love it), and the value they assign to them is not comparable to the worth of their production. They just buy it.
But it is a fight to know that value of what you are paying for.
tl;dr -- the product is there, I couldn't care less it being there or other liking it, but defend the right to sell it and the right to buy it (it doesn't shoot lasers at kittens does it?), and explain why a wiser man than me might also purchase one or more.
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An interesting report from Bruno. As poor as the linearity reported by Bruno is, it makes me wonder to what degree msb's subjective (presumably, positive) sound character is due to their discrete converter's distortion level proportionally tracking the signal level, sort of the way open loop class-A gain stages behave. Which, of course, is opposite to the way D/A converters usually behave.
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I wondered if the subjective performance is down to them having a relatively low-glitch DAC architecture. But then seeing the measurements with their high levels of higher-order distortion I rather discount that hypothesis now. Also they seem to be running the DAC 'core' at least 16X and probably 32X oversampling - inferred from the ruler-flat FR and the way the digital filters are described. Such a high degree of oversampling wouldn't be consistent with low glitch energy which is for me the no.1 USP of a NOS DAC.
My tentative conclusion for the subjective approval is that its still a multibit DAC in an S-D world, lacking the noise modulation effects of the latter hence PRaT is good despite the relatively poor distortion performance.
Just to add some context to the discussion on subjective performance, and the influence of price on reviewers' opinions:
For those who haven't discovered this, Colloms's historical ratings, doesn't include the latest evaluations ... HIFICRITIC, audio review magazine, hi fi critic.
And, a post in another thread here, which quotes from a more recent issue of that magazine, one that I haven't seen ... http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/vendors-bazaar/190434-hypex-ncore-203.html#post2901176
Frank
For those who haven't discovered this, Colloms's historical ratings, doesn't include the latest evaluations ... HIFICRITIC, audio review magazine, hi fi critic.
And, a post in another thread here, which quotes from a more recent issue of that magazine, one that I haven't seen ... http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/vendors-bazaar/190434-hypex-ncore-203.html#post2901176
Frank
For those of you who have heard these expensive DACs, can you really hear a significant difference in sound quality over the cheaper DACs? And is the difference proportional to the cost?
My personal, arbitrary distinction for "expensive" is over $500. The most expensive DAC I've ever bought (or heard for that matter) was $360 (used, new is $450 I think). I'm just now wading into DIY DACs, so have even less invested in that arena. While I can definitely hear a difference in sound quality in the relatively cheap DACs I've played with, I feel I'm already in diminishing returns territory. Unless, that is, there are some big sonic hurdles to leap over that I haven't even yet approached.
I read about these crazy expensive DACs (or any audio component, really) and feel conflicted. Part of me wants to hear it, to see if I'm really missing out. But the other part of me says ignorance is bliss AND low-cost!
And the other question is, if you have a DAC with a 5-digit pricetag, surely the rest of the components have to be of a similar level? Like 6-figure speakers, and a matching 5-figure amp?
My personal, arbitrary distinction for "expensive" is over $500. The most expensive DAC I've ever bought (or heard for that matter) was $360 (used, new is $450 I think). I'm just now wading into DIY DACs, so have even less invested in that arena. While I can definitely hear a difference in sound quality in the relatively cheap DACs I've played with, I feel I'm already in diminishing returns territory. Unless, that is, there are some big sonic hurdles to leap over that I haven't even yet approached.
I read about these crazy expensive DACs (or any audio component, really) and feel conflicted. Part of me wants to hear it, to see if I'm really missing out. But the other part of me says ignorance is bliss AND low-cost!
And the other question is, if you have a DAC with a 5-digit pricetag, surely the rest of the components have to be of a similar level? Like 6-figure speakers, and a matching 5-figure amp?
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