[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 22 Jun 2012 16:23:31 -0700, Peter Wieck wrote
(in article ):

On Saturday, June 16, 2012 10:31:54 AM UTC-4, Audio Empire wrote:
I can hear the howls of derision now from certain parties who post here=
=20
regularly. I'm out of my mind. There can just be no other explanation for=
it!

Mpfffff.

I will accept "sounds different" and I will even accept "sounds better" as =
long as you add "to the two of you". Hey. That is why there are many flavor=
s of ice-cream, and why stuff like Nutella or Bovril or SenSen still exists=
. De gustibus non est disputandum.=20

As to trouncing a $7,000 DAC, that is to be expected rather than to be a su=
rprise. Given that after the first $150 or so the remainder is eyewash, smo=
ke and mirrors one will be inevitably disappointed with any results out of =
such a box assuming an honest listener is giving an honest opinion both rar=
e commodities.=20

On the other hand, many here, including this person, still maintains a viny=
l system or systems. And still takes pleasure in it. Along with tape, casse=
tte, CDs, OTA tuner and HD tuner. And take pleasure in all of them. Which i=
s better is a function of many things several of which are not rational.=20

Peter Wieck
Melrose Park, PA


When one source of a performance sounds constricted, compressed and strained
with a harsh top end and/or flabby bass and the same performance from another
source is NONE of those things, but is, instead clean, with no OBVIOUS
constriction or compression with a silky sounding top end and good taut bass
with good extension, then that second presentation sounds better and more
musical than the first. It's really that simple.

There are lots of reasons why that might be so, and none of them really have
anything to do with digital vs analog, per se. It has to do with the quality
of the source material which, in these cases, would be so-called master
tapes, which might not be microphone masters at all (and in fact probably
aren't). But are rather third or fourth generation copies and might even be
LP mastering copies that have been eq'd and compressed (with all the bass
summed to the left channel) with LP cutting in mind. It also may be because
these later CD transfers were indifferently mastered by people who don't
really care what they sound like ("...this stuff is fifty-plus years old. Who
cares about the sound?"). You never know.

I have all of the RCA Red Seals remastered by BMG to SACD. I figured they
ought to sound great because they are SACD. I bought the whole catalogue
(some 60 discs) while they were available. They certainly sounded OK, and
when they didn't come up to expectations, I put it down to master tape
deterioration. Well, then JVC started to send me some of their Red Book XRCDs
of many of these same titles. I was flabbergasted at how much better these
JVC XRCDs sounded than the same performances on SACD! It was hard to believe
that both came from the same master tape! The difference was, apparently,
that JVC had access to the microphone masters of some of these recordings and
they REALLY carefully made their Red Book CDs from those. The SACDs - well,
who knows?

Also, and I'm not saying this to be unkind, anyone who thinks that all DACs
sound alike (as you seem to be saying) haven't really listened to different
DACs in double-blind sessions. They do not sound the same. They may sound
superficially similar, but they differ in the details. Things like soundstage
presentation, depth, separation of instruments in the orchestral sound field
and high frequency distortion are all over the place from DAC to DAC. These
things are readily heard in a controlled DBT by anyone who cares to listen
carefully. Sure I've run into people who have sat-in on DAC DBTs and have
sworn that they cannot hear these things, but it's been my experience that
such listeners have come into these tests with a chip already firmly in place
on their shoulder and something to prove in their hearts. Take away what you
will from that.

Audio_Empire