2. misc-audio
  3. 164675-109487

I saved alot of money.

Many of you will probably disagree but I have to share. I recently started streaming from my cell phone to my system with Amazon HD and You Tube Music. 
Components are a new Hegel H390, Bryston A2 speakers, NAD C 546BEE CD player, and wait for it, a cheap Auris bluetooth thing.
Sounds great but I thought about getting an expensive streamer and/or a separate DAC.
After weeks of research I thought of doing a test. The CD player is hooked up via coaxial to the Hegel. The Auris is connected via optical. So both are using the Hegel's DAC.
I put a favorite CD into the NAD and hit pause, then pulled up the same on Amazon. Without moving from my listening position I switched between the two.
Very little difference if any between them.
I tried this with different CDs 3 different times over a week and had the same results.
My system may be cheap compared to what many of you have but my love for music is as strong or better than anyone out there.
At 66, retired, and on limited funds I'm sure glad I did this test. The results must be due to the Hegel's DAC.
Thoughts?


golden210
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,570 posts
 
That is the beauty of digital. It is just numbers. Does not matter where the numbers come from. Only the final clocking is important. 
I just did a similar comparison of a high res file to the same file being played over my Sonos network. Could not tell the difference.

Golden210, I think it is because you and I have crappy hearing:-)
dougsat
374 posts
 
What a great concept buy what you can afford and enjoy what you have. It’s all about the music in the end.
cd318
2,636 posts
 
@bluemoodriver,

"..but there's a kicker: after we all confirmed that we could hear meaningful differences, Wilson whipped a fake component shell off the digital source and revealed that with the Wilson speakers we weren't listening to the $20,000 CD player that had been used for the competitor's speakers, but an Apple iPod playing uncompressed WAV files!”

"Airplay is red book standard now, and blind testing tells us differences in rates above that are inaudible."



Even through premium priced products.

That was a little naughty of Dave, but he proved his point though, didn't he?

Perhaps we would all do well to remember these valuable little lessons?

Otherwise we can risk ending up like the art critic that was extolling the qualities of a particular work of art. 

Only to later discover that it was created by a chimp. Beauty might well be in the eye of the beholder, but apparently not if they are wearing a blindfold.
audio2design
1,351 posts
 
In another thread I said that effectively, a good $150 DAC is far more accurate than a $10K (or much higher) turntable setup, and that a $150 DAC playing a well digitized version of R-R, would be much closer to that R-R than any turntable would be. I consider those to be honest statements. They are about communicating the recording, not preference. It does not take massive spend to communicate the music in the data. If you want a particular flavor to that communication of the music, that is where the big dollars comes in.
bluemoodriver
193 posts
 
Audio2design - another posting of perfection. 

More to discover