Musetec (LKS) MH-DA005 DAC

@yyzsantabarbara 

I totally get the rational of @toddk31 of returning the DAC. I may have done the same thing if I were in his shoes.

I look at it this way. I am lucky I bought the DAC and listened before these measurements issues arose. Reason being I was in the camp that my gear has to both measure well and also sound good to me. I likely would have returned the DAC.

However, today I have a changed my view on the measurements as a main criteria for keeping gear. The 005 has shown me that it is not the most important factor. BTW - I said this on the ASR 005 thread and people got offended, mainly because I heard differences in DACs.

Sometimes fundamental logic has to take centerstage. you have possession of a DAC in your home with easy access to your audio system. Would not the first rational step be to placed it into the system and simply listen? if not, why not? It is puzzling that the first inclination is to ship a newly purchased and unheard DAC off to be measured. Again why not hear it first in your own familiar audio system?

It is an "audio" component which would imply that it is to be used to listen to music reproduced in one’s home. I am trying to understand the logic of how test measurements supersede the optimal opportunity to hear and judge in your own system. Interesting priorities.

Charles

Another interesting (and obvious) question is do to different pieces of audio equipment that measure the same sound the same. If the answer is no, then the ASR philosophy goes down in flames.

@ja_kub_sz

+1

I have read by this point in my career thousands of EKGs of my patients. That EKG analogy was awfully poor and misguided. ASR and Audiogon are clearly two very different crowds. Good that they both exist and readers can simply choose what suits them best.

Charles

@dbb Yes but it's your brain telling you it sounds different when the tests speak for themselves. How could one piece of wire sound different from another one? It's just impossible.

We're all scientists here so don't dispute the facts.

Jen Psaki and all her BS would get on great over there.

The reason testing crowd can't get past measurements is they simply can't get past the idea of NOT trusting their senses, or anyone else's for that matter. The one listening test they use, blind testing is so often inconclusive, which only proves the faultiness of our senses for them.  I've watched these O vs S arguments for so long, always circular, and always goes back to distrust of senses. I'd think it wise and logical for measurement crowd to measure listeners as much as the subject or component under review. For them, testing of listeners is validated by plenty of existing measurements of human hearing, the individual sensory perceptions never addressed. They invalidate individual sensory perception through a priori inability to control for it. In other word, individual biases of all kinds contaminate the results, therefore, this can't conform to good science.

Trying to apply science to audio reproduction and our individual sensory perceptions is a futile undertaking. Removing the individual sensory perception part of equation allows them to claim this is good science. I've argued at the point they have  robot or replicant  of myself, with testing apparatus built in to measure all my sensory perceptions in relation to reproduction of music over audio components I'll believe this good science.

Testing and measurements also bring to mind, analog/vinyl setups vs digital, vinyl measures much worse in some parameters, yet many consider vinyl reproduction the reference for audio reproduction. I certainly hear a difference in analog vs digital audio reproduction. Do SINAD , dynamic range, or any other measurements explain explain all these differences. And what about the instruments that produce this music, can measurements explain the texture and tonality of a Stradivarious violin vs. that of  generic,  both measure exactly the same, they HAVE to sound the same according to measurement crowd!  Well, I guess musicians have been wasting their money on these equally instruments for centuries, they're just imagining they have superior or even different sound qualities. Not hard to imagine the smugness of those who judge us as deluded and reliant on our totally faulty sensory perceptions. I can only say I'm awestruck by the textures and colors I hear at live concerts and in music reproduction on my system, the unmeasurable content makes all the difference for me!