I certainly agree that specs and measurements will generally provide little if any insight into how a component sounds. And I certainly agree that buying based on specs and measurements is almost certain to result in expensive mistakes.
However, I doubt that there are very many, if any, serious audiophiles having even a little bit of experience who buy based on specs and measurements. Although those who express disdain for specs and measurements often seem to make the IMO false assumption that those who consider specs and measurements to provide value do buy in that manner. In other words, a straw man argument.
The very considerable value specs and measurements can provide, as I see it and as I've mentioned in a number of past threads, is that when purchase decisions are being made they allow candidates to be RULED OUT, on the basis that they would be poor matches with either other components in the system (e.g. impedance incompatibilities, gain and sensitivity mismatches, etc.), or with the listener's requirements (e.g., dynamic range and maximum volume capability).
Without taking advantage of those kinds of benefits that can be provided by specs and measurements (and a good understanding of them), the randomness of the component selection process increases greatly. As does the likelihood of expensive mistakes.
And I suppose also that now and then there will be instances where poor measurements will be indicative of design problems that may be sonically significant, but which the reviewer may not have perceived for one reason or another. Perhaps because either his ancillary equipment or the recordings he used did not bring it out, or perhaps because he simply overlooked it.
If measurements are so poor as to suggest that kind of possibility, my question would be why buy that component, or even include it on one's short list for audition, when most likely others are available at a comparable price which sound at least as good and also don't have those measurement issues?
Apparently the Allnic review is in the December issue, which I haven't received yet. But I've read through the Lector review which Onhwy61 mentioned. With respect to the "dreadful" measurements which JA cited I can't say in general how likely and to what degree those may be sonically significant. What particularly strikes me, though, is his statement that "USB Prober appeared to indicate that the Digitube operated in isochronous adaptive mode rather than the preferred isochronous asynchronous mode." If in fact that indication of the "USB Prober" was accurate, use of the older and now largely superseded adaptive USB mode, rather than asynchronous USB, makes the device a non-starter in my book.
And perhaps most significantly, I would point out that in general adaptive USB sonics can be expected to be a good deal more dependent on the particular computer that is used than would be the case with asynchronous USB. And note that Dudley's sonic assessment was done "primarily" via USB. Which means that even if his assessment was 100% accurate, that assessment stands a good chance of not having much relevance to use of the Lector device in a different setup.
Best regards,
-- Al
