Mitch2 - no offense taken. As I said, I am very happy with my 2 Streamer IIs and I do agree that Dudley is the odd man out on this discussion. I do wonder if there was something else going on in his system that was adding to the problems he reported. It is also possible that his PC was struggling to provide adequate clean power to the HD. In any case, the HD seems like a good option, although once you add in an outboard power supply it reaches a price with a lot more competition.
I do agree that reviewers with the influence Dudley has should take extra steps before reporting a poor result. I remember when Chris over at Computer Audiophile panned the M2Tech HiFace when it first came out. People were dumb founded, since most people found it a very good product at the time. I always thought he should have gotten another sample and tried other systems before his poor review. I know it can be a lot of work, especially for a low end product, but I still think reviews should go the extra mile in that type of situation.
I do agree that reviewers with the influence Dudley has should take extra steps before reporting a poor result. I remember when Chris over at Computer Audiophile panned the M2Tech HiFace when it first came out. People were dumb founded, since most people found it a very good product at the time. I always thought he should have gotten another sample and tried other systems before his poor review. I know it can be a lot of work, especially for a low end product, but I still think reviews should go the extra mile in that type of situation.