dsdreamer;597215 Wrote: > I used to have a Benchmark DAC1 in my system in my SB3 days, but after > purchasing a Touch and doing some careful listening with the Touch > direct and through the Benchmark, I found that if anything the DAC1 > sounded a little forward and slightly grainy in the treble region, but > otherwise very similar to the Touch. > > I know for sure that the Benchmark DAC1 measures better than the Touch, > but since I could not hear it in my system with my ears, it made no > sense to keep it. > > NOS DACs definitely break some rules, but in order to make a very > specific trade: elimination of pre-and post-echo. (A similar motivation > lies behind the use of apodizing filters in DACs and CD players, but > without allowing excessive aliasing.) > > I don't think use of NOS techniques should be ruled out on principle, > even though the presence of some inverted spectrum "music" added into > the near-ultransonic region is -prima facie- the wrong thing to do. If > you like it in your system, fine, but it's probably not for everyone. > > Frankly, I just don't think there is a thoroughly good way to reproduce > music that has to be band-limited to 22kHz before sampling. That's one > half of the damage, the remainder is done by an additional low-pass > filter to suppress the aliases, when reconstructing a continuous > waveform from the samples. Leaving out the alias suppression filtering > clearly avoids further low pass filtering, but cannot remove what was > done to make the recording. > > Everything we do here is some kind of compromise, which why some DACs > and CD players offer multiple types of filter shape (e.g., sharp, > smooth or minimum phase). None of them is the right answer; the only > real solution being significantly faster sampling rates for digital > recordings. > > I was reminded how much of a difference sampling rates make to the > overall musical experience by downloading and listening to some of the > free samples here: > http://www.lessloss.com/high-resolution-audiophile-recordings-c-68.html > Listening to the 24-bit/96kHz Bach recordings played though my SB Touch > reminded me how wonderfully present, natural and non-fatiguing digital > music -can- sound.
The trick is to the record the stuff at 24/192 or higher and digitally re-sample to a consumer format , theese filter does way more damage at ADC end than the DAC end. And as most DAC's oversample 128 times and use a very benign filter in the ultrasonic region. So this is actually a solved problem. So if you get a correctly recorded and mastered piece of music on CD (16/44.1) and play it back on a modern DAC chip , you will enjoy sound without analog brick-wall filtering artifacts. If you want to compare 24/96 vs 16/44.1 you must get a piece of music actually digitally recorded at >= 24/96 PCM (not a ripped dsd or old analog thing) an acoustical classic piece as the one you suggested ? or similar. Then resample it to 16/44.1 on your computer. Now you have two pieces of music that are the same but on different sample rates. You will never get this with commercial discs the "CD quality" track is never the same master, so it's always apples and oranges. Some of us would argue that now you cant hear the difference. I'm convinced that on a small number off really good recordings there still is an improvement that makes it worth the effort. But most of the "hirez effect" is the aviability of really good masters that previously was not there for the original CD. I do miss DVD-A for a reason. multichannel 24/96 that is something else entirely :) no it's not a gimmick. apodizing sounds interesting.. can not afford even more expensive meridian gear right now :-/ -- Mnyb -------------------------------------------------------------------- Main hifi: Touch + CIA PS +MeridianG68J MeridianHD621 MeridianG98DH and assorted amps SiriuS, Classe' Primare and Dynadio speakers, Contour 4 Contour Center, and Contour 1.3SE rear ch. Rel Stadium 3 sub. Bedroom/Office: Boom Kitchen: SB3 + powered Fostex PM0.4 Misc use: Radio (with battery) PLEASE FIX BUG 112 http://bugs.slimdevices.com/show_bug.cgi?id=112 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Mnyb's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4143 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=83976 _______________________________________________ Touch mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/touch
