"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message

David Satz wrote:

- My better preamps (Millenia Media HV-3B, FMR "Real Nice Preamp",
Grace Lunatec V2 and V3, M Audio DMP3, Sonosax SX-M2, Symetrix
SX-202, and a dbx 760X modified by Jim Williams) all had low noise
and distortion when stimulated by this test signal, with small
differences in favor of the Millenia Media preamp. They had
distinctly different distortion spectra, but were more or less
similar in the total amount of their distortion.

I can believe this. Now, what happens if you put a 1:1 transformer in
front of one of these? The transformer should be much more of a
source of distortion.

Indeed.

- The M Audio "Flying Calf" A/D converter, surprisingly, held its own
against far more expensive converters, while the D/A section of the
"Flying Cow" converter was not nearly as good--though my "Cow" is an
older model, and the chips (cow chips?) in their newer models have a
higher specification.

There are also some board layout changes too, which may make for a
change in stability.

I tested two different revisions of the Flying Cow:

http://www.pcavtech.com/adc-dac/Cow/index.htm

The "Revision E" was pretty impressive, and says a lot for the philosophy of
continual evolutionary upgrades at M-Audio,