I kind of agree in practise, but I would like to unpack what I see as the real problem.
There is more benefit than downside with digital VC, if correctly implemented (low distortion and *dithered*). It's possible with SoX. There's another requirement, that the attenuation is *moderate*. I'll discuss this toward the end! With several popular DACs, the ASRC and upsampling stages NEED digital headroom to perform correctly with highly dynamically compressed music i.e. most modern music! https://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?98661-Some-observations-about-the-Benchmark-DAC1&p=747509&viewfull=1#post747509. That means they need digital volume control (unless they have digital headroom built in specially like the BM DAC2/3). With these DACs, you simply won't be able to enjoy many modern recordings to the same level without doing this. Here's a visualisation of the difference on a modern recording (inter-sample overs clipped vs not-clipped): https://www.pinkfishmedia.net/forum/threads/some-observations-about-the-benchmark-dac1.137152/#post-1990168. 6dB of attenuation is enough. People with smart phones, sound bars, mini/micro-systems etc. are actually better off in this way, because digital VC is built into these devices. I wouldn't be surprised if this was a big part of many audiophiles' complaints of modern recordings. Obviously there's damage done by dynamic compression that can't be fixed, but why add extra damage unnecessarily? Many DACs these days are hot via XLR - 4VRMS, some much higher - and *if the DAC is being used preamp-less*, this leads to excessive digital attenuation. Which is bad. Or necessitating the use of XLR attenuators, which I would argue is also bad. But Weiss have the ideal approach with a mixture of reference voltage adjustment in the analogue domain for coarse adjustment - so the XLR output level can be adjusted to 2VRMS (typical RCA output level) or even 1VRMS - followed by dithered digital volume control. All this without need for XLR attenuators. Also dCS do well in this regard. So I'd say digital volume control brings many more benefits than downsides as long as the attenuation is moderate - and the problem is the design of many DACs with too high an output level to be used optimally when preamp-less. The reason the output levels are creeping up is that it makes it easier to achieve a better SNR/THD+N measurement, which people slavishly follow e.g. on ASR. It's a pity manufacturers are chasing one number to the substantial detriment of certain use cases e.g. using the DAC preamp-less. Check it, add to it! http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/ SB Touch ------------------------------------------------------------------------ darrenyeats's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=10799 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=111714 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/audiophiles
