seanadams;368317 Wrote: > The supposed purpose of the product is to somehow resolve impedance > mismatches, which makes no sense to begin with. The marketing material > goes only as far as the following hand-waving: "Impedance matching is a > complex technical issue in audio design." and then proceeds to bemoan > the failure of manufacturers to disclose their exact input/output > impedances (as if those were critically important). And yet, even he > fails to disclose the input and output impedances of his own product.
I read this guy's site, and the more that I think about it, the more furious I get. Is Sean the only one who spotted the obvious flaw in this? No mention of his I/O impedance! None. And what if he did? HOW ON EARTH IS IT GOING TO MATCH ANY OTHER COMPONENT OUT THERE, UNLESS THEY DESIGNED THEM AS WELL? This is one of the most disingenuous marketing ploys that I have ever seen. I guess that I now have 3 myths to dispel. (Sean, if this violates the spirit of your forum, just tell me and I will shut up.......) 1.) There are 75 ohm RCA connectors. Not unless someone re-invents the laws pf physics. 2.) Scientific Conversions make the best digital audio transformers in the world. Only if the definition of "best" is lowest interwinding capacitance. (You can read my diatribe on this over at AC.) 3. Impedance matching is essential for audio components. If not, you have wasted power. Wasted power........horrors! This is such a bone-headed idea to begin with, let alone fraudulent marketing claims. Someone needs to call this joker on this. A lot of small firms try hard to make good products at a good price, and we somehow always seem to get lumped in with jokers like these guys. But, let's play along with his dumb game. Suppose, just suppose, that he actually makes a device that magically matches its input Z to the output Z of your digital audio product. What do you think will happen? It will probably distort like all get-out. I don't know of very many audio components, especially CD players or similar products, that can drive a low impedance. Most are designed to drive at least a 10 kilohm load. Not a 100-500 ohm load. What a joke. Translation: you don't transfer power in audio. Period. Now, I can not make any claims that this buffer will or will not sound good. I can only say with 100% certainty that their marketing claims are 100% BS. Did anyone see the mention that the "buffer" has 6 dB of gain? Buffers don't have gain. Period. Ok, if you did have a matched load (which by now you should know is not supposed to be), then you will have exactly a 6 dB loss. So, he uses this to justify its 6 dB of gain. Which may actually be beneficial in a lot of systems. But not for the bogus reason they cook up. Which means that it really isn't a buffer, but a preamp. You need another marketing ploy to sell a preamp. I won't speculate what they would conjure up to sell a preamp. But, one could draw the conclusion that it didn't sound as good as their attempt to sell a buffer. But back to what Sean says above......... Most audio devices, like preamps, do work best when their output Z is around 100 ohms or so. But..........and don't ask me to explain why, 'cuz I may not know the exact reason........digital audio products -seem- to sound better when the output Z is in the 300-500 ohm range. Just like the Duet!!! Sean and his team figured that out without having to spend >25 years designing this stuff. Pat -- ar-t http://www.analogresearch-technology.net ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ar-t's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=13619 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=56068 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
