Amir,
Everything makes a difference. I listen to everything I can afford. I (currently) have little money. I cannot A/B expensive AC sockets.....my friends do. What I do is eliminate them as much as I can for the best sound possible. I hardwire a cable into my inverter and at the other end use a good connector into the compoent. The IEC plugs at the component end are the chinese Viborg ones. I cannot afford to try the Furutechs or I would. The AC inlets on my equipment are the Furutech $27 ones. I prefer those to the NCF Rodium version. I hardwire my speaker wire into the speaker and clamp the other end to wires to the wires coming out of the amp.....all connectors suck. The best sounding speaker post I have heard is the WBT copper Nextgens. On and on......I do everything I can.....I listen to every single thing I can afford to listen to. My friend with the Apogees can afford more....so does more. He has one of those burn in machines and burns in all his AC connectors, all cords, capacitors, etc. for hundreds of hours. Everything makes a difference.
There is something called "common knowledge" If you are in a beach town but don’t know where the beach is, you ask someone on the street and they point a direction and say.....3 blocks that way. You are probably going to get to the beach by following their instructions 90% of the time. They may be direction challenged or just plain ignorant. But if you ask 3 people and they all said the same thing then you are likely to get to the beach 99% of the time. Same with audio. My friend with the Apogees researches and researchs for hours and hours before deciding to buy something. He has so much info from several people who have heard these things and are reliable enough to trust that he has NEVER ever been let down by his purchases. He does not trust one persons review or mention. He would never trust what someone says about sound quality if they have not listened to it (someone like you.....you have no knowledge for you do not listen). The common knowledge he gathers is reliable and turns out to be true when he gets the piece of gear and puts it into his system. So, when he speaks about it it has even more clout....for he has added his own experience. But he already KNEW how it would sound because HE TRUSTS others experience and TRUSTS his own experience. You do not trust your self or anyone. This is your problem. You think hearing is fallable and you HAVE to have to do blind tests to know anything. This is pure BS. Blind tests....as I stated before are for the deaf.
My aural memory lasts for decades. If I use a particular test piece over and over again I will remember how that piece sounded for years and years. When I play that exact recording on my latest stereo I know if my audio reproduction is a good as back then or not. Example one: Back in the late 80s I used the Stereophile test disc #1 music cuts as one of my main test recordings. Then I put it away and did not listen to it for awhile......but in the late 90s pulled it out and played it on my stereo. Where is the air on the triangle? How come the guy that is singing in hebrew sounds veiled and ugly? I say to myself. This is not how it sounded years ago! I had this 3 way speaker at the time......so I decided to remove the midrange a prop it up on top of the speaker and unwound the inductor on the woofer so it would go to up to 300hz instead of 150....so it would fill in the loss that the midrange would have because it has not on a baffle or in a box. After setting it up......it sounded the same tonally.....so my tweaking was good. However, the sound was now WAY frickin better (first time hearing an open baffle midrange besides electrostats or maggies). The triangle was floating in air.....the decay lasted way longer.....the guys voice singing was now beautiful......Was is as good as years before when I played it on my super modified Quad electrostats? Not quite......but dang good. It was my aural memory of the recording that got me to try and improve my system so it would match my memory. This happened again to me just a month ago when I set up my new open baffle two way speaker. This time is was an over 40 year old memory of an album I had not heard for that long (La Folia de la Espana) that got me to tweak my speaker more. Now it sounds almost as good as I remember the record sounding back in the early 80s (playing a CD now)
If you research ALL the reviews on Topping D90s and all the reviews on the Tambaqui.....you will then be able to interpolate how they sound versus each other even if no one had them both together (with incredible accuracy). For instance....lets say one reviewer said his $4K Dac was way better than the Topping.....then you see another review where someone compares that $4K DAC with the Tambaqui. If you trust those people (which, of course, you would not) then you have some real information....that when combined with all the comments from everyone you read gives you a common knowledge about those relative pieces. You will KNOW something about them without actual listening. When you get something in and have your own experience and then talk about it versus whatever and post it somewhere then you add to the common knowledge about these things. If you do not trust yourself or anyone then you just go to Amirs site and buy the best measuring thing that you want. Very simple. You trust no one (just measurements) and end up with good but never great sound. If you want great sound....you need to investigate first and gather common knowledge and then listen for yourself to confirm.
If I or anyone said they owned both the D90 and the Tambaqui and they said the Tambaqui is way better.....you would not believe them. You would ask them if they did a double blind test......and how many people were there to confirm. Even if they said they did a double blind test and there were 20 people who confirmed......you would still not believe them. You would have to have them submit a study to the Amir super critical dept. and have it reiviewed by the head Amirian and then most likely put at the bottom of the stack. This is how stubborn you are. You are not going to do research on listening tests on the D90 or Tambaqui. You would consider it a waste of time. You already KNOW how they sound versus each other (WITHOUT even listening)......To you, they sound the same because they both measure like you want. Very silly childish game you play.
So, no I have not listened to either the Topping or the Tambaqui.....but I have read enough reviews about them that gives me a sense that I KNOW what they sound like relative to each other. This is not rocket science. Like I said, my friend has never bought something he regrets after doing super research. He trusts certain people and their comments. Me too. You neither trust yourself or anyone. Again.....NEVER trust any ONE person......go for the common knowledge. Common knowledge is held in common....amongst many. My freind used to say "it all comes out in the wash" Meaning.....after many cyles of listening and evaluating you know the truth.....the true colors of you cloths and the true sound of something. But first, you have to wash your mind of doubt. You have to let your self experience and know......and know that your mind is not the knower.....your soul is.....You have to get your critical mind out of the way to really listen and really KNOW. I wish you much mindlessness. It is the same as mindfullness.....but devoid of monkey mind ego chatter. Can you dig?
The question is....Do you truly love yourself?....not in an ego way....in a pure Mothers love way. Do you trust yourself? Not in a jilted lovers way.....but in the way a baby fully trusts his mother. Do you purely love and trust others? Or do you need to control and fight and defend your position? Only you can answer for yourself. You know yourself.....exactly how loving and trusting you are at any moment......if you are willing to look. Most do not want to look, for if they looked closely their fear is that they would see how unworthy they are. THIS is the BIG LIE. We are incredible, magnificent angelic beings.....capable of feeling and sharing and radiating all the love and joy of the universe. WE are all living miracles.....Now, LET US CELEBRATE!