Poor Allnic Dubious honour of worst measuring DAC ever for Stereophile

[Bruce B]

If you run your analogue through a decent A/D ( I use the Weiss ADC2 ) you will not be able to distinguish it from the 'live'
analogue replay.
Keith.

B.S..... I have/had the best A/D converters money can buy, including the Weiss, and you can easily distinguish it from the source!

 

[PeterA]

Ha! I hate you and your kind.

I meant no offense, Geardaddy. I was attempting to inject a bit of humor into the thread. I sincerely apologize for being so insensitive. Happy New Year.

 

[wisnon]

I meant no offense, Geardaddy. I was attempting to inject a bit of humor into the thread. I sincerely apologize for being so insensitive. Happy New Year.

I think he was being sarcstic.

 

[microstrip]

Then what is the point of this thread exactly? Providing a philosophical counterpoint seems a logical response to me.

Maybe, but that would presuppose incompetence. Given the caliber of the presenters, unlikely. They are not haphazard cheeseballs like many of us....

My expectation was that someone having direct experience with the DAC would chime - otherwise I fully agree with you.

Other than a poorly carried demo, what is your explanation for such a large and immediately felt difference?

 

[Bruce B]

you must have 'golden ears' bruce, how old are you ?
Keith.

lol...!!

 

[wisnon]

My expectation was that someone having direct experience with the DAC would chime - otherwise I fully agree with you.

Other than a poorly carried demo, what is your explanation for such a large and immediately felt difference?

From A-Gon:

12-19-14: Ketcham
I sent my personal D5000 south for some bench tests which tested with similar results to John Atkinson. Interestingly the person who was kind enough to take the time study the dac also auditioned the dac and found it quite musical and enjoyable. He believed the abhorrent test results are attributed to the inherent characteristics of the DHT tubes.

Is it the DHT analog oputput that caused poor test results or the digital section?

 

[garylkoh]

B.S..... I have/had the best A/D converters money can buy, including the Weiss, and you can easily distinguish it from the source!

Bruce, I completely agree. It does take a trained ear though. When we did an level-matched comparison between inserting a A-to-D and D-back-to-A chain in a system, a room full of audiophiles couldn't tell the difference. Even if they thought they could tell the difference, they got it wrong 50% of the time. Bruce got it right 4 times out of 4 when we did a dry-run together with the executive committee members of the club. He even explained what to listen for.

See what we did at the Pacific Northwest Audio Society in this thread - almost 3 years ago..... and ADCs and DACs have hugely improved in the past 3 years.

http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showthread.php?2632-The-Digital-Analog-Dialectic

 

[microstrip]

From A-Gon:

12-19-14: Ketcham
I sent my personal D5000 south for some bench tests which tested with similar results to John Atkinson. Interestingly the person who was kind enough to take the time study the dac also auditioned the dac and found it quite musical and enjoyable. He believed the abhorrent test results are attributed to the inherent characteristics of the DHT tubes.

Is it the DHT analog oputput that caused poor test results or the digital section?

Thanks Wisnon. Can you point me a link to this discussion in Audiogon? I have been following the Direct Heated Triode Tube DAC by Allnic Audio Labs thread, but could not find any reference to this statement (perhaps my glasses fault )?

 

[wisnon]

Sure Microstrip, not a problem:

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?ddgtl&1416079453&openfrom&26&4#26

There are 2 Allnic threads there in the Digital Forum, plus lots of discussions in the comments of the Albert Porter ALL OUT ASSAULT page under Virtual systems.

 

[bmoura]

Actually we do know something. Ketcham on another forum sent out his Allnic Dac to be tested locally and got essentially the same result as Stereophile. Still, he says his Dac soiunds good to him.

Interestingly Stereophile was going to re-test the Allnic DAC after a tube replacement - but then the DAC was sold. So I guess we won't be getting a do-over on the technical review of that DAC after all.

"Allnic is returning the review sample of the D-5000, fitted with known good tubes, to me. I will be publishing a Follow-Up review in a spring 2015 issue.–John Atkinson

I wrote that response to David Beetles's comment in good faith. However, after his comment and my response had been published, I was informed that that review sample had been sold. Allnic has offered to submit a new sample for a follow-up review, but that would not allow me to investigate whether or not the original sample's measured problems were indeed due to one or more of the tubes having become faulty, as he claims.–John Atkinson"

http://www.stereophile.com/content/allnic-d-5000-dht-da-processor-manufacturers-comment

 

[bmoura]

AFAIK, this had been rectified by firmware update 1.2.1 a long time ago. It is one of Stereophile's joint digital product of the year 2014

Along with Sony's HAP-Z1ES Digital Music Server! Nice.

 

[knghifi]

Along with Sony's HAP-Z1ES Digital Music Server! Nice.

Digital is like computers so don't chase the latest and greatest. I have a fairly decent system and my budget was ~$10,000 to replace my PS Audio PWD MKII. Finally decided on a ModWright Sony HAP-Z!ES and VERY satisfied with my decision. Dan's new transformer coupling design is a HOME RUN. It DESTROYED the PS Audio PWD MKII which was very surprising. It has excellent SQ, internet radio and ease of use. Was also considering Allnic D5000, Lamp L7 ...

 

[Geardaddy]

I meant no offense, Geardaddy. I was attempting to inject a bit of humor into the thread. I sincerely apologize for being so insensitive. Happy New Year.

I very much enjoyed your humor and returned it in kind....

 

[Geardaddy]

From A-Gon:

12-19-14: Ketcham
I sent my personal D5000 south for some bench tests which tested with similar results to John Atkinson. Interestingly the person who was kind enough to take the time study the dac also auditioned the dac and found it quite musical and enjoyable. He believed the abhorrent test results are attributed to the inherent characteristics of the DHT tubes.


Is it the DHT analog oputput that caused poor test results or the digital section?

That is the million dollar question. It must be the tubes!

 

[Geardaddy]

Interestingly Stereophile was going to re-test the Allnic DAC after a tube replacement - but then the DAC was sold. So I guess we won't be getting a do-over on the technical review of that DAC after all.



http://www.stereophile.com/content/allnic-d-5000-dht-da-processor-manufacturers-comment

What hapless audiophule would buy such a dac?

 

[amirm]

I suspect there are more "broken" audiophile DACs than this one model. Here is my Son's $400 DAC that had such extreme jitter on one of its inputs:

So little of these DACs is measured that we just don't know how they perform.

 

[Geardaddy]

I suspect there are more "broken" audiophile DACs than this one model. Here is my Son's $400 DAC that had such extreme jitter on one of its inputs:

So little of these DACs is measured that we just don't know how they perform.

I think that's the take-home message of this thread. It would be interesting to correlate various measurements of tube based dacs in particular and see what specific forms of "distortion" romance the listener.

Wisnon, are there any reviews of the L7 with measurements to date? I have not seen any....

 

[microstrip]

I think that's the take-home message of this thread. It would be interesting to correlate various measurements of tube based dacs in particular and see what specific forms of "distortion" romance the listener.

Wisnon, are there any reviews of the L7 with measurements to date? I have not seen any....

Fortunately my CD player and DAC were never extensively measured by any magazine, although HiFi-News magazine has shown less than stellar measured performance for similar Metronome units. Having listened to it playing in several top system including the top Hercules and XLF's or the top ARC's with the TheSonusfaber, I am sure that unless real life is 2D and boring, for me these units sound much more like real music than many others that measure much better in conventional measurements. Surely YMMV, it is just stereo reproduction.

 

[wisnon]

I think that's the take-home message of this thread. It would be interesting to correlate various measurements of tube based dacs in particular and see what specific forms of "distortion" romance the listener.

Wisnon, are there any reviews of the L7 with measurements to date? I have not seen any....

Not that I am aware but you have seen the results from the L4 test at Hifi-Critic from 2 years ago…we discussed it at Audiocircle. It was quite respectable.

The only take home message is that Allnic had a poor result and may need to address it with some design changes. Trying to cast a wider net is just obfuscation, especially as it seems its the digital section that has problems and tube or SS output stage would thus be irrelevant.

 

[awsmone]

I can understand that added harmonic distortion and gritty noise can give the illusion of greater reality and happy for people who go for this sound

But it's the digital section that's at fault

And it's either

1 designed in to improve the sound quality by the engineer and thus measures that way
2 sounds better that way and it's a happy design accident

3 it measures poorly cos it is poor SQ !

Only one of these three opinions shows deliberate design intent

If there is design intent for this measurement

Let's hear what it is ?

I think that is a simple request