So I’m 51, and had my hearing tested a couple of years ago. I asked if my score was a pass for a 49 year old, and he said that my score would have been acceptable if I was eight. That said, I know I have lost some ability, and gained a little more background noise. Not horrible, but it’s there.
I was making a decision on a new piece of gear last week that I was auditioning - an EMM Labs NS1 streamer, and comparing it with my tried and true Bluesound Node 2i. I was always under the impression that the streamer really didn’t matter as long as all the bits were there. The magic really happens in the DAC, which in my case is also an EMM Labs. Much to my chagrin, I heard some very large differences between streamers both going into the same DAC. Was it a bias? Is my hearing even good enough to hear the differences?
i enlisted the help of my 14 year old freshman daughter. She loves music, but has no interest in high fi. I promised her a simple A/B off four tracks, one of which she knows very well from her iPhone and Beats. Surprisingly, she listened to A (Bluesound) and then sat up straighter when I switched to the NS1. She had no idea of what I was switching, by the way...I was able to leave everything connected and A/B with the remote. I switched the order up on track 2, left the same order for 3, and then back to the original order on track 4. I didn’t even tell her what to listen for. She picked out almost everything that I picked out in every track. The sound of actual air coming from a saxophone. The clarity in background farming parts. One guitar turning out to be three, sequenced over each other. The familiar track was Taylor Swift’s August, and she was like, I have never heard this song sound like this. So, my findings verified, I bought the NS1. My stayed in the room and listened for another two hours to so music of her choosing. (Priceless to me.)
