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Up & Over sampling Is one superior to the other?

I see many contrasting ideas on up sampling, and over sampling. I want to get a DAC quite soon and have gotten the impression from reading reviews, that up sampling is a more forward presentation and can be analytical.... over sampling is more resolving and refined, yet laid back sounding.

Have I the wrong thoughts here? or is therre any truth to those diffs?

Do tubes really make significant diffs over strickly solid state (given all else is resonably the same)?

I thought to try making sure before taking the plunge.

I am most grateful for any help here from those who have had both or either...
blindjim
audioengr
3,282 posts
 
"Why does North Star allow upsampling at the transport level? Is it indeed the same upsampler as in the DAC."

Identical. The reason is the I2S interface. It is evidently more efficient design-wise to upsample in the Transport and then output 24/192 to the I2S interface. The transport can also output native rate on the S/PDIF outputs.

When you use the Transport and DAc together with S/PDIF, the DAC does the upsampling only if you select this. With the I2S interface the transport always upsamples to 24/96 and the DAC does no upsampling.

Steve N.
muralman1
1,527 posts
 
Steve, how do the two sounds compare?
audioengr
3,282 posts
 
The upsampled data, either using SRC on a computer or 24/192 from the Northstar transport is more dynamic, much smoother on vocals and more detailed than native 44.1.

Steve N.
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