Where’s My Weakest Link?

Otterbein 

I haven’t heard to many DACs in that range, but the Mytek Liberty and the Schiit DACs in that range would be high on my list.

if you buy used, perhaps a Benchmark or a Chord QTest.

All will be huge upgrade over the DAC in the Node2i.

I don’t know much about your speakers, and they may be an issue, but I can tell you for sure that your DAC could be significantly upgraded

I agree with millercarbon in that some decent cables (look at the opening price point Black Cat) and some rudimentary room treatments (first reflection points are a good starting point) before buying new components.

Dont take millercarbon too seriously. He has gone past drinking the Synergistic Research Koolaid; he now swims in it.

I dont know the Carver preamp but I have never liked anything I have heard made by Carver. Have not heard his new tube amps. 

All these ridiculous tweaks are pointless! There is no perfection and it cannot be obtained no matter how many insane tweaks you attempt. Second of all, just because someone’s perception that some bizarre off the wall tweak did something perceptible (subjective), does not mean that it will even be noticeable to someone else. My god, when do such persons ever relax and just enjoy the music! Constant tweaking and torquing this and that is absurd...unless you love to aggravate yourself to no end...I don’t get any of it. Lastly, I hardly even have the time to listen to my system as I’m considered "essential personnel" and therefore must go to work every day...I would never have the time to tweak this tweak that, nor would I want to. If something needed that much tweaking, then maybe just maybe that component just plain sucks to begin with...all my opinion....now take me to the gallows.....or behind the wood shed lol...🙄
Just a few examples....fuses?? Yea I’m going to open up a piece of expensive equipment and screw with the design of the piece that someone far more knowledgeable designed...ahhhhhh no....and most equipment clearly states somewhere, no user serviceable parts meaning don’t touch! I don’t feel the need to burn my house down. And another, raising cables off the floor! How ridiculous, unless you have microscopic hearing or the ears of a bat...lastly, a multi thousands of dollars rack is going to make an ounce of difference...mmm, yea ok... as long as your equipment is not sitting on something from ikea, I think you will be just fine. Lastly, obsessively tweaking the position of a cartridge to achieve some kind of perfect alignment when it does not exist. As soon as you move the freaking thing, you just changed another parameter duh! You get it close, close is about all you will ever achieve, plus every record you place down on that platter is different, so what is the use of obsessing. Life is too short, I’ll be dead before I ever achieve any thing remotely close to perfection, I’ll just listen to my music.

All these ridiculous tweaks are pointless!

Arrogance is not always wise.... :)

This thing that audiophile calls "tweaks" in fact is a misnomer for something way more essential to know and which is underestimated and most of the times not very well known...

All my " tweaks" gravitated around the many controls of the 4 embeddings of any audio system...Mechanical, electrical, and acoustical in a passive and active way...


Most people think they can judge , speakers, amplifier, or dac, or any new audio component, by simply put it in the linked chain and listening to it all out of the box... This is totally false...


This is the most important thing I ever discover in audio...

Most of the times those who speaks about "tweaks" speaks of that in a not too much enthusiastic way, like if these "tweaks" are only secondary means or methods and not so important way to improve the sound, compared to an upgrade....This is false....( I dont count the few "ignorabimus" that denigrate)


Most of you or at least a vast number of people owns an audio system probably already very good, but if they listen to it in non controlled environment , with no rightly prepared embeddings, most people will never know what their audio system is able to give in S.Q. never...


This is plain truth....Dont buy anything this year, think about that instead....

By the way all my controls means (tweaks) are very low cost, and mostly homemade....They totally transformed my system audibly and without doubt in a more than good audio system....

I’ll be dead before I ever achieve any thing remotely close to perfection,

The goal is not obsessive search for perfection, the goal is to rightly embed in his mechanical dimension (vibration-resonance) in his electrical grid, and transforming in a passive way and also with active means the acoustical field of the room....

This is not obsession this is a good job done in a systematic way.... This is simple small fine tuning engineering works …. Those obsessed are those who cannot controls their own negative emotions towards others opinions...

I don’t disagree about common place basic tweaking, the ones that have stood the test of time and are logical...like speaker positioning, using a protractor to align a cartridge ( getting it close or maybe closer), isolating a turntable (of course!), and using quality cables and interconnects (why would you not!). But there are some here professing this and that as if it’s the gospel, which it is not. To each their own, I prefer not to drive myself nuts, when there are already enough people that do so daily....
The things you mention above, I have already done, because they are smart things to do. I have an expensive, at least to me, power conditioner, a dedicated 12 gauge line from panel to living room, an upgraded copper outlet/receptacle, a turntable that is isolated on a dedicated shelf mounted to studs of which are affixed to a concrete wall, and a very stable support for my components made of wood. My speakers are positioned correctly, at least to my ears and hearing capability, my wires/ cables are all top notch, and they are routed away from power cables and or run perpendicular and not parallel. I think I've done enough. 

You want to hear something even crazier?? I recently bought a pair of tannoys priced at 6k, and to be honest? They don’t necessarily sound better than the speakers they replaced (my wharfedale 225’s, which I still own). They sound different, but I would not say better! Call me nuts, but that is what I hear....when a manufacturer or designer gets something right, regardless of price, they just get it right.