DAC Manufacturer Aversion To External DSP

[Jud]

On 7/1/2020 at 10:32 AM, bluesman said:

The wise consumer buys the seller as well as the product.

 

Truer words...

 

Yes, I think some manufacturers are reluctant to have customers tinkering with the sound. One of the problems here, I believe, is that a lot of these folks are hardware rather than software guys, and if a customer has a problem, they won't be able to help.

 

One other factor may simply be that some manufacturers might want to hold the only keys to the kingdom. If audiophiles start realizing how easy it is to get great sound inexpensively from software, the hardware manufacturers are reduced to selling the analog circuitry and parts quality. Look at DAC marketing and see how much of it concentrates on the digital side, especially filtering.

[Jud]

10 hours ago, sandyk said:

Hi Jud

For the majority of members who are more than likely to own DACs costing < $1,000, (especially the Objective types who believe that is the most a great sounding DAC should cost) I wouldn't call any of the touted S/W solutions here inexpensive, after you factor in the additional cost of fast processors, improved USB cables, ISO Regens etc.
 OTOH, if you are a very smart "Legal Eagle", who is also pretty clued up in this area as well , you are likely to call these additions inexpensive. 😉

 

 Kind Regards

Alex

The DAC I currently own was about $400 IIRC. It is not world class, simply by virtue of analog circuitry and parts quality. Truly world class software is available for half that amount or substantially less. So while not insignificant to some folks, true high end software is much less costly than its hardware equivalent.

[Jud]

2 hours ago, sandyk said:

 Hi Jud

 I was thinking here of the most touted solutions in this forum from Miska and Peter, where you need much more than their S/W to take full advantage of them .

Alex

Miska’s software does require stout hardware to run higher resolutions with some (though not all) of the filters and modulators, but XXHE and Audirvana don’t particularly. And since they all run on general purpose computers, if your computer is a fairly recent model you should be able to run most of the available software filtering and upsampling for essentially no added hardware cost.

[Jud]

2 hours ago, asdf1000 said:

 

 

Belden USB cable?

 

Or Belkin?

 

The former.

 

https://www.bluejeanscable.com/store/data-cables/indexmob.htm

[Jud]

13 hours ago, asdf1000 said:

 

I don’t see anything there that says their USB cable is Belden.

 

I do know their ethernet cables are.

 

Sorry, you're correct, was thinking of Ethernet for some reason. Don't know about USB.

[Jud]

59 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I say people need to get real networks, rather than run from Ethernet.

 

Interested in learning more.

[Jud]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

There are many people using a single “Xfinity” supplied modem / router / switch to run their entire house and audio systems. Plus, some people get curious/dangerous and use creative networking with bridges, loops, and unnecessary configuration pretzeling. It all amounts to trouble. 
 

Getting a “real” network designed by someone who knows what s/he is doing, or educating oneself on the topic can go a very long way. 
 

I should start keeping track of the messed up things I see (no blame though, people just don’t know what to do). I’d soon have a list like this one -

 

https://structuretech1.com/home-inspection-photo-gallery/

 

Is there already an Audiophile Style article on best practices? Would love to see one (in your spare time, right?). Might be interesting to have you and plissken both write one and see similarities/differences.  

[Jud]

6 hours ago, Bob Stern said:

 

(Interesting aside: without naming names, RME's user guide said other music player software claiming to have a Direct Mode using non-mixable 32-bit integer format failed RME's bit perfect test.)

 

Audirvana's Direct Mode hasn't been available for many iterations of MacOS. I think the check box may be selectable even on MacOS versions where it isn't available, so the UI may cause some confusion.

[Jud]

44 minutes ago, Bob Stern said:

 

Hi, Jud!  I thought there was a hack to install a kext that enabled Direct Mode on later Mac OS versions.

 

There is but I assume RME wasn't using a hacked OS for its tests.