Digital Improving All the Time?
I hear it here all the time - digital technology is constantly improving…usually being told to someone afraid of buying something that will be obsolete soon. It is true that, with the advent of high-quality Asian products, prices on some excellent digital has come down to the point that one can buy a very nice dac for under 1k and an excellent one for 5k. But I don’t see that the technologies improved over the last 20 years. The Naim 555 and the Vekian and Wadias were astounding products built long ago. Even now, some of the best dacs from Audio Note and Jadis use old chips and the darling ladder dacs are even older technology. Ok, some use the FPGA thing, but that’s basically just a home-rolled chip, which does add a bit more flexibility to the architecture, but that’s about it, IMO. And yes, some companies like DCS and MSB built $100k dacs that I’m sure sound great, but other companies probably could have done the same thing 20 years ago by adding huge power supplies and stuffing them with the most expensive parts and construction quality possible. But they probably didn’t think anyone would buy them. And I’m not talking about streaming and such, because that is relatively young in its development. Streamers may well be improving, but I don’t see dacs as constantly improving, as is so often said. Good day.
I have a modest 9.2.2 Klipsch Atmos system in my theater room that makes the soundtracks of my KDrama programming sound great. Lots of great music and much of the lyrics are in English. Janet Suhh, an American singer has found success in this genre. Funny, when I want to listen to music..off to two channel and a less immersive, but more pleasing 2.2 room. Digital is the future and multichannel will dominate, but the improvement in technology will help us all. |
“And I’m not talking about streaming and such, because that is relatively young in its development.” This would be incorrect as i have been streaming over 10 years now. I bought my first streamer from Aurender in 2011. The market is now flooded with streamers and servers at all price points. As far as DAC goes, a high quality DAC from 10 years ago is just as relevant today. The newer DAC certainly improved in the areas of noise isolation, jitter, clocks, power supply and chips. And accept higher resolution upto DSD1024. |
The crystals especially temperature controlled over clocks the precision has just gotton much better, the-regulators too are much lower noise then even 3 years ago . very low distortion resistors for the R2R ladders has gotton better also all these little things add up ,even super caps ,and FPGA units forstreaming the new Synergistic Research Ethernet hub truly brings streaming to a new level much more analog and detailed even compared with say the uptone Audio Ether Regen hub which is great for $640, the Synergistic is retail $2k my brother owns one and I have had in my system for a weekend ,I am buying one for sure, it truly takes your streaming to a new level ,very noticeable improvement. |
@chyro |
@aewarren the Laser Prostate Center in Houston may be able help with that. I can now chug a couple of Big Gulps and open a pressure washing service. |
