How good is Benchmark DAC1 comparing to......

I'm reluctant to dip my toe in this thread considering some of the monkey business that's gone on above IMO, but Uva_hifi's astute last post tipped me over the edge - in a good way (something I couldn't have said about some of his earlier posts here, to be frank).

I just want to invite anybody interested to this archived thread of mine, since nobody on this one posted to that one. It's about an A/B auditioning methodology I devised for fairly objective evaluation of outboard DAC's (either comparing multiple DAC's and/or various settings available on a single unit). My hope was to encourage others to run the test I describe and comment on their results, but so far none have, despite the thread receiving well over 2,000 viewings. But who knows, maybe someone coming from this thread will take the plunge...

Zaikesman, you took 3 pages and probably a week of manipulation of your setup to hear what I heard under normal listening and a/b conditions, and we came to essentially the same results. What makes your method superior if folks can come to the same conclusion without all the added complexity? KISS, right?

I said I was reluctant to dip my toe in this thread - but dip I did...

Uva_hifi: As I believe I mention in the linked thread, the formal testing did tend to confirm my casual listening evaluations, which were similar to your own. But to my mind, that fact in no way invalidates the worth of the test method, partiuclarly in light of how many listeners and reviewers subjectively rated the Link DACs highly.

The test gives more than a subjective impression - it gives an aurally qualifiable and quanitifiable demonstration of exactly how much and in what ways any DAC deviates (or doesn't deviate) from the signal fed it, without requiring technical measurement gear and expertise (which still don't tell us much about how something like a DAC actually sounds). I don't hold that my test is in all ways "superior", if what we're after is mainly sound that's personally enjoyable. But I do think the method is valuable and enlightening, and would like to see it used by reviewers as an adjunct to strictly subjective auditioning. (I feel the same way about interconnects and preamplifiers, both of which are relatively easy to run bypass comparison tests on, though reviewers virtually never do this.)

I invite you to try my test, providing you're set up to do it, and then tell me if the experience was a waste of time. If I'd found it so, I wouldn't have bothered writing an article about running it. I even had fun doing it. (But then, maybe I'm simply more curious than some other audiophiles, and/or less afraid to rigorously examine my own opinions of what I think I hear.) Thanks for making the effort to read it and sharing your take though.

Thanks a lot Rx8man for your effort.

...the two DACs that seem to go head to head in the value for the money sweepstages are the dAck and Benchmark. You can read about both of them right here on Audiogon.

P.S. ...though I have 4 possible DACs to listen to, I have not yet heard the Benchmark DAC. Very envious of the sound a loaner dAck 2.0 production unit I got to borrow for a day.

Happy tunes,