The Emperor Has No Clothes!!

No one is immune to confirmation bias. Key is to be able to not rush to judgment, spend enough time to gauge the differences, if any, and only then draw your conclusions. You seem to think that this could not possibly be the case and you’re looking for a confirmation of your confirmation bias. Anyone is welcome to chime in. But you will get participants from both camps. Your confirmation bias won’t be indisputably confirmed. 

Based on @mdalton posts, I don’t see why anyone should give any credence to OP opinions on streamer/server…he is a hard core Vinyl enthusiast and he will never pursue or ever concede to a notion that a SOTA streamer/server can outperform a Vinyl setup. Just my .02 cents. 

@mdalton  

First off, I haven’t heard a streamer that is “tube like” but I’ve only heard a small fraction of streamers out there.  There are CDPs that use tubes ; is it really nuts for a streamer to do the same.

Secondly, do non audiophiles laugh at us?  Of course they do; it isn’t a “dirty little secret “.  There are probably less than half a million audiophiles in this country.  Most people are content with lousy sound.

so i used the car example to try to take some of the audiophile mysticism out of the equation.  (Another common example is that most people have very different responses to a man with a deep voice saying something, vs. a woman -or man - with a high pitched voice saying the exact same thing.)

But back to my car example: I’m a very experienced driver. I’ve been driving high performance cars - mostly manual transmissions - for almost 40 years.  So I have a similar passion there to my audio passion.  So maybe it’s not quite as good an analogy for others as it is for me.  Regardless, in that case, I know that the science tells me what I’m feeling is not an accurate representation of what’s actually happening.  Don’t need to measure it because I don’t have any doubt.  I could measure it however, though in this case it would  be a pain to do so.  My approach to audio is very similar.  If I feel something that science - or measurements - tell me is not actually accurate, I don’t reject the science.  It helps me sort thru my experiences to weed out those that are not an accurate representation of what is actually occurring.  That way, I can spend my money where I can be sure it will make a real difference.

Of course, maybe my car example is telling me not to overthink it.  Maybe if I just enjoy the moment, and let myself be carried away by my passion for my hobby, I don’t need to spend much at all, just put my gear thru a $40 monthly wash, lol!