DAC Differences
In article , KH
wrote:
On 11/19/2012 8:12 AM, Audio_Empire wrote:
In article , KH
wrote:
On 11/18/2012 7:59 AM, Robert Peirce wrote:
In article ,
Audio_Empire wrote:
snip
That is why I gave up trying to evaluate individual components outside
my system. If a $100 piece of equipment sounds almost as good as a
$10,000 piece of equipment in my system, why on earth would I want to
spend all the extra money? This applies at any price point, but I think
most of the higher priced stuff is likely to be better controlled, and
therefore, more likely to fit pretty well into any system, while more
poorly designed equipment will reflect its surroundings.
I don't know that "...the higher priced stuff is likely to be better
controlled," is necessarily the case. One-off or hand-build stuff is
more susceptible to manufacturing defects than with automated assembly
(witness the DAC chip itself).
Who said anything about "one-off" or "hand built"? Believe me a dCS
Puccini, or an MSB DAC IV is neither, yet these are expensive components
and sound it.
There are many examples of "higher priced stuff" that are virtually
one-off's, or are hand built. If you'll note, the comment I responded to
was not limited to DACs either.
And surely cost is no judge of proper
design; if it were, many of the high-end pathologically poor DAC's would
never have existed.
I certainly agree with your sentiment on going cheaper when it doesn't
make a difference. $10K more spent on better speakers will almost always
trump, IMO, whatever small difference it could buy in a CD player, DAC,
or certainly cables.
Well, that's a slippery slope.
I don't see how you reach that conclusion. Can you cite one example of
any component in an audio system where a $10K upgrade would buy a
greater difference in sound quality? Obviously if you have very good
speakers already, trading them for a $10K more expensive pair may not be
nearly as significant as going from a $1K to an $11K pair, but I still
think you'd be hard pressed to hear anywhere near as much *difference*
in going from a $1K DAC to a $10K DAC as you *could* hear from a speaker
upgrade (given you choose speakers wisely to fit your tastes).
Obviously, that above a certain quality level, one enters an area of
diminishing returns (with almost anything), where large and larger
expenditures yield smaller and smaller improvements. But in the case of
DACs, I suspect that you are quite correct. Yes there is a difference
between the sound of the AudioQuest DragonFly and the Ayre Acoustics QB9
at 10X the DragonFly's price and yes, I do prefer the sound of the Ayre,
but it's not a huge difference. It's gives more dimensionality to the
playback and is somewhat more resolving, but I can live with either of
them. I think if I were in the market I'd probably go for the Ayre
(today - unless I hear something even better in that price range
tomorrow) but that doesn't mean that the DragonFly isn't a marvelous
accomplishment. I have another USB DAC called a Beresford TC-7520 (it is
also sold as a TEC TC-7520 and hails from Taiwan) and even though it
costs a little less than the DragonFly, the difference between the two
can be likened to the difference between a pair of really good speakers
such as Wilson Watt/Puppies against a decent table radio like a Tivoli.
And certainly the difference between the DragonFly and Ayre QB9 isn't
anywhere NEAR that great, It is nonetheless just that scoche more
involving.
Of course you need a pretty high-res
system (speakers included) to appreciate the difference between a $100
DAC and a well designed one costing thousands of dollars.
But that is the point you labeled as a "slippery slope" above.
You misunderstood me. What I was saying was that as we all know, more
money doesn't ALWAYS result in better performance, but it does
SOMETIMES. For instance, the best speakers I've ever heard are
Martin-Logan CLX paired with their matching subwoofers. That combo is
about $28K. Now, you can pay many times that if you like (the Wilson
Alexandria XLFs at $200K or the Magico Q7s at $165K come to mind). And
at that price you get great speakers, but are they, ultimately 5 to 8
times better than the M-Ls? No, and in fact in a lot of ways, they
aren't as good (needless to say, they aren't as good TO ME - they don't
do what I value in a speaker as well as the M-Ls. So that is my opinion.
YMMV).
Expensive
cables are, of course, a complete waste of money as the laws of physics
and simple electronic theory say that interconnects and cables that are
properly designed for their application, will have no sound, and that
there is little one can do to wire to make any difference at audio
frequencies; especially in the lengths that audio hobbyists are likely
to employ. IOW, yes, 50 ft of 18 gauge speaker wire will likely affect
the sound of one's speakers but 50 ft of 12 gauge probably won't.
Agreed.
Keith
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