AndreasG Wrote: > 1. > If you say that the output level of the Squeezebox is lower than that > of your CD player, this makes a comparison very difficult. If you want > to compare the quality of two sources, you need to match signal levels. > This means you have to actually *measure* the analog output signal > levels. Otherwise all testing is in vain and you will only fool > yourself. Louder will always sound better, even if you don't realise > that it is louder. Adjusting volume "by hand" is not sufficient! I suspected as much. Whenever I buy yet another remaster of some CD, I like to compare it against the previous release, just to convince myself I've not wasted my money (yet again :-(); but usually the levels are sufficiently different to make this tricky.
> Let me repeat this because it is so important: *You have to make > abolutely sure that the signal levels going to your power amp are > absolutely the same, wether source is the SB or the CDP!* You can > achieve this for example by using a preamp with adjustable gain for > each channel and then measure the output levels of the preamp on both > channels with pink noise. Ah, clearly I'm not a true audiophile, for this sounds like too much effort - I'm happy to go with my subjective feelings! But anyway, the main reason for getting an SB3 was to repeat the same sort of "playlisty" freedom at home that I'd been enjoying for a while on the move with my Zen; I was even willing to sacrifice a *small* loss in quality to achieve this, and was pleasantly surprised at the SB3's performance (purely subjective again). Also, the Alpha 6 CDP is now 13 years old and (despite an overhaul a couple of years ago) seems to be developing an intermittent tracking problem. I'm not sure I'll bother to replace it. > 2. > You have to ask a friend to help you with a blind test. Well, I could ask my wife, but then I suspect she wouldn't be as impartial. Even if she was just switching inputs :-) > 3. > If the problem then persists, I think you qualify for an audiophile. > :D > Go buy the most expensive DAC you can afford. Haha... but these days I think that the "quality bottlenecks" in my audio chain are my own ears :-) -- Brian Ritchie ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Brian Ritchie's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2319 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=22273 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
