Transparency vs "Symphonic coloration" in modern DAC gear.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

wisnon said:
Mixing metaphors here. SD card is a transport and Mirus is a Dac. So are you saying the Mirus is not a reference for transparency when fed by other means? And would any old Dac be such a refence with a quality SD card feed???

The Mirus is a DAC with built in SD card transport.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

wisnon said:
Perhaps, but do you have $500K to shell out. For the record, to my ears the B7 destroys the Invicta or Mirus as a Dac and the GG will TOTAL destruction. LoL

Have you ever recorded a track in DSD 256 with the Merging Hapi or Horus via the GG analog outs and played it back via the Mirus SD card transport? You'll likely find you'll have a hard time distinguishing it from the GG playing back the same original track.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

Purite Audio said:
Why would you want to?
Difficult enough to create a decent room/speaker interaction.
Keith.

Some people like coloration.

Audiophile Bill · Oct 28, 2015

still-one said:
I want gear that gets me as close to what I want to hear. Whether is accurate to how it was mixed is almost irrelevant since I will never listen to the music through headphones or a pair monitors sitting a few feet in front of me.

I will say I prefer gear that is tilted towards accurate. That said when I A/B gear to see which goes into my system I just pick the one that gets me closer to what I am looking for.

Agreed - like any sensible person would imo!

wisnon · Oct 28, 2015

Blizzard said:
The Mirus is a DAC with built in SD card transport.

I know exactly what the Mirus and Invicta are...

DaveC · Oct 28, 2015

I don't think we understand and/or can measure pleasant distortions well enough to reproduce them accurately. Assuming one even believes they exist... for example copper cables offer lots of pleasant distortion vs something neutral like UPOCC silver, but many would dispute such differences are real and measuring this may not be possible. Paper coned drivers can make acoustic instruments sound more real vs other materials that produce lower distortion, but this phenomenon is similarly difficult to define given our incomplete knowledge of audio.

The other issue with distortion is it reduces resolution by masking fine details, in a good system this is not a positive. In a system that has unpleasant distortion like harshness, grain, etc, pleasant distortion generally sounds better as it masks the unpleasant distortions. But you end up with a system that is much less resolving and thus less engaging. Given enough experience people generally prefer a more accurate and resolving system as long as it does not produce unpleasant distortion that leads to listening fatigue. So, IMO we should concentrate on eliminating unpleasant distortion rather than adding pleasant distortion as a band-aid.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

Audiophile Bill said:
Agreed - like any sensible person would imo!

Nobody agrees with that more than me. Which is why I believe in custom tayloring the sound to your exact taste in the digital domain.

Audiophile Bill · Oct 28, 2015

Purite Audio said:
N I among a great fan of DSD I'm afraid, this paper sums it up for me.
http://www.weiss.ch/assets/content/41/white-paper-on-DSD.pdf

Keith.

But Keith is that because you actively don't like the sound of dsd or sacd or is it because you don't like the theoretical science?

Audiophile Bill · Oct 28, 2015

Blizzard said:
Have you ever recorded a track in DSD 256 with the Merging Hapi or Horus via the GG analog outs and played it back via the Mirus SD card transport? You'll likely find you'll have a hard time distinguishing it from the GG playing back the same original track.

I don't see the point that you are making. You could say the same about any source including analogue. Record an Airforce 1 and Air Tight Magnum Opus into quad dsd - playback through your beloved and you have an airforce 1.

bonzo75 · Oct 28, 2015

Bill he doesn't believe in analog, according to him modern tech is better

Audiophile Bill · Oct 28, 2015

Blizzard said:
Nobody agrees with that more than me. Which is why I believe in custom tayloring the sound to your exact taste in the digital domain.

But herein lies the issue. Please provide a link to this state of the art digital filter that sounds exactly like the product that it is "copying" - I will test it on my oppo for you as my oppo has measurements that make it entirely transparent to within the specified criteria of the human ear (no need for merging stuff). I will order Kondo Ongaku with American Sound turntable sporting a Koetsu coral stone.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

DaveC said:
I don't think we understand and/or can measure pleasant distortions well enough to reproduce them accurately. Assuming one even believes they exist... for example copper cables offer lots of pleasant distortion vs something neutral like UPOCC silver, but many would dispute such differences are real and measuring this may not be possible. Paper coned drivers can make acoustic instruments sound more real vs other materials that produce lower distortion, but this phenomenon is similarly difficult to define given our incomplete knowledge of audio.

The other issue with distortion is it reduces resolution by masking fine details, in a good system this is not a positive. In a system that has unpleasant distortion like harshness, grain, etc, pleasant distortion generally sounds better as it masks the unpleasant distortions. But you end up with a system that is much less resolving and thus less engaging. Given enough experience people generally prefer a more accurate and resolving system as long as it does not produce unpleasant distortion that leads to listening fatigue. So, IMO we should concentrate on eliminating unpleasant distortion rather than adding pleasant distortion as a band-aid.

This is why I presented the challenge to Bruce B to try to reproduce the sound of the Lampizator GG by recording DSD256 with the Merging Horus connected to the GG outputs. If the Horus recording in DSD 256 is truly transparent like they say, played back though a truly transparent DAC, the sound should be indistinguishable from the GG.

This is the true test and Bruce is the only one I know of on this forum who has the gear to do it.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

Audiophile Bill said:
I don't see the point that you are making. You could say the same about any source including analogue. Record an Airforce 1 and Air Tight Magnum Opus into quad dsd - playback through your beloved and you have an airforce 1.

If the ADC, digital format,and DAC is completely transparent, this is correct.

It's also my exact point I've been trying to make.

Audiophile Bill · Oct 28, 2015

Blizzard said:
If the ADC, digital format,and DAC is completely transparent, this is correct.

It's also my exact point I've been trying to make.

Then what has it got to do with the Golden Gate. Just say that in your opinion professional grade analogue to digital converters are transparent. No more to be said. No relevance to any other topic other than that of recording.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

Audiophile Bill said:
But herein lies the issue. Please provide a link to this state of the art digital filter that sounds exactly like the product that it is "copying" - I will test it on my oppo for you as my oppo has measurements that make it entirely transparent to within the specified criteria of the human ear (no need for merging stuff). I will order Kondo Ongaku with American Sound turntable sporting a Koetsu coral stone.

In order for this to work you need to have gear good enough for the task. I'm not talking about measurements here. But you'll usually find that these components measure very well.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

Audiophile Bill said:
Then what has it got to do with the Golden Gate. Just say that in your opinion professional grade analogue to digital converters are transparent. No more to be said. No relevance to any other topic other than that of recording.

Because Bruce has a Golden Gate DAC at his disposal. And it's a super popular DAC that adds color to enhance listening pleasure. Perfect candidate.

wisnon · Oct 28, 2015

Blizzard said:
In order for this to work you need to have gear good enough for the task. I'm not talking about measurements here. But you'll usually find that these components measure very well.

Why not do it with your Mirus?

bonzo75 · Oct 28, 2015

Blizzard said:
See above comment. It was Bonzo's discription discribing the type of coloration experienced from tube gear for instance.

Lol I said lampi sounds better on symphonies, provides more details, slam, speed, separation of 50 acoustic instruments for classical music, and their tone. You morphed this into the phrase 'symphonic coloration'

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

wisnon said:
Why not do it with your Mirus?

The Mirus wasn't designed to produce pleasant colorations to the sound. It's designed for transparency. So poor candidate. But good candidate for the playback end.

Blizzard · Oct 28, 2015

bonzo75 said:
Lol I said lampi sounds better on symphonies, provides more details, slam, speed, separation of 50 acoustic instruments for classical music, and their tone. You morphed this into the phrase 'symphonic coloration'

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Transparency vs "Symphonic coloration" in modern DAC gear.

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