Please Educate Me


If I can’t find the answer here, I won’t find it anywhere. 

Something I’ve wondered about for a long time: The whole world is digital. Some huge percentage of our lives consists of ones and zeros. 

And with the exception of hi-fi, I don’t know of a single instance in which all of this digitalia isn’t yes/no, black/white, it works or it doesn’t. No one says, “Man, Microsoft Word works great on this machine,” or “The reds in that copy of Grand Theft Auto are a tad bright.” The very nature of digital information precludes such questions. 

Not so when it comes to hi-fi. I’m extremely skeptical about much that goes on in high end audio but I’ve obviously heard the difference among digital sources. Just because something is on CD or 92/156 FLAC doesn’t mean that it’s going to sound the same on different players or streamers. 

Conceptually, logically, I don’t know why it doesn’t. I know about audiophile-type concerns like timing and flutter. But those don’t get to the underlying science of my question. 

I feel like I’m asking about ABCs but I was held back in kindergarten and the computerized world isn’t doing me any favors. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some work to do. I’ll be using Photoshop and I’ve got it dialed in just right. 
paul6001
OP, I hope you are still around but I wanted to make two points. First is that everything has a sonic signature, components, wires, resistors, whatever, they all contribute to the sound. Second, the music starts and stops as analog, it's what happens in between that are the things we talk about. 
"What are you taking about?I guess english is your third language maybe."
These two do not look that fluent, either.
@paul6001
Be careful in this forum, it’s full of rough and tumble stereo hobbyists. A much tougher crowd than the model train folks, but not quite as hard as the heck raisers over in the woodworkers forum. (That group is banned in two states, you don’t want to know why)

You crossed the line when you asked a question. Well, it’s really not the question, but the way you asked it, your grammar, and possibly the moon phase. Your zodiac sign may have played a part. 

Apologizing and humbling yourself as you ask
will sometimes make you a lesser target than some other innocent soul simply posing a question. It rarely works, but worth a shot.

May the force be with you....