this statement wouldn't sell to the gearslutz crowd
LOOL True, definitely wouldn't.
this statement wouldn't sell to the gearslutz crowd
You should educate yourself before making meaningless assertions.You are mistaken, SMSL DAC is completely transparent.
Educate how, what are you talking about? Feel free to enlighten us? This DAC has 0.00035% distortion you're not going to tell us you can hear distortion differences at this small a level are you?You should educate yourself before making meaningless assertions.
It is a 200€ device, not gold. You say completely transparent. That is impossible. Every dac sounds different.
This is absolutely, one hundred percent invalid as has been TIME and time again tested by a BLIND test comparing non-broken DACs (so no tube output stage or other horrid intentional defect). Every DAC sounds different, lol have you got anything whatsoever to back this up?
This is a science forum, you don't barge in here with 15 posts and declare stuff like that as an absolute truth. Just, no.
This is a science forum, you don't barge in here with 15 posts and declare stuff like that as an absolute truth. Just, no.
Every DAC sounds different. As simple as that. Here people review different DACs. Different hardware. Different sound. I have compared my impression on two different dacs, one being the title of this thread. So I think it is relevant. I am not talking of absolute truth. I reported my impression and testing conditions. Absolute truth is the guy who said ' SMSL DAC is completely transparent'. That is zero scientific.
Assessed how?there is a bump around 2.5-4 Khz, the top end is rolled-off
That is highly debatable.Every DAC sounds different.
My listening test is scientific in that it is in a controlled equipment settings and comparing to another hardware's dac. Of course they are my impressions of my own hearing. I am not evaluating 'transparency' in a frequency analysys result, but transparency as I hear music from one to another equimment and what sounds better and more faithful to me.Your uncontrolled sighted listening test is not scientific, drawing the conclusion this dac is completely transparent is based on the objective data we have on this dac and human hearing.
It becomes debatable when comparing two DACs where the measurable differences in performance are so small as to be below the threshold of what is likely to be audible. So this is not to say that all DACs sound the same, but equally technology has developed to the extent that many objectively probably do, and as such your statement that 'all DACs sound different' becomes contentious. I know nothing about the performance of your other DAC to comment on this specific case.Every model of dac sounds different because hardware and chip implementation is different. I don't see how this can be debatable.
I got my SU-8 a few days ago from Massdrop. I am pretty impressed with it. I am using the balanced outs and am starting to notice pops when the file format or resolution changes. I didn't have that with my old DAC, which was single ended and I just tried the RCA outs from he SU-8 and I don't get any pops when the format/resolution changes. I am using FOOBAR2000 as the player on a windows 10 pc.
Are pops normal when there is a change in file format and/or resolution with balanced outs on this DAC? Or is that just because of the balanced outs and would be the same as other DACs using balanced outs?
I got my SU-8 a few days ago from Massdrop. I am pretty impressed with it. I am using the balanced outs and am starting to notice pops when the file format or resolution changes. I didn't have that with my old DAC, which was single ended and I just tried the RCA outs from he SU-8 and I don't get any pops when the format/resolution changes. I am using FOOBAR2000 as the player on a windows 10 pc.
Are pops normal when there is a change in file format and/or resolution with balanced outs on this DAC? Or is that just because of the balanced outs and would be the same as other DACs using balanced outs?
I haven't had a thump yet, but the pops are not that loud. I didn't notice them the first couple of days but most of my music is CD rips, so maybe I just didn't catch it. If its normal then fair enough. I don't get any pops with the RCA outs. My unit is firmware 1.6.Yes, I hear a low level pop when sample rates change. Nothing startling though. A bigger concern is the occasional thump when I turn the unit on.
Yes, I hear a low level pop when sample rates change. Nothing startling though. A bigger concern is the occasional thump when I turn the unit on.