This is what I was getting at in an earlier discussion today regarding the Linn and Lyngdorf cost ratio and performance. The High End market can "sometimes" be deceptive and contrarian with regard to cost, prestige and pecking orders. Very tricky at times.
See, you were probably trying to get at this, by being polite, but you really didn't get to the you're-so-full-of-crap part. That's very tricky at time.
Here's the deal though, perhaps I'm thinking on a quantum level. We all pay a certain price of admission, whether we buy some junk DAC for $50 bucks, and call it the best, of a $50k DAC and call it a turd. One might get you a seat to watch the game, while the other probably puts you in a skyebox, meeting the cheerleaders, getting player autographs, and sipping something a bit better rated than Ripple.
I mean, you can drive a Pinto and call it a Cadillac, but you'd be wrong, even though in your mind you can imagine the Cadillac chassis around that Pinto engine. There are DACS like that, too.
The point is, again, that last 3%-1% is a real mother. That's where most of the bread is spent, or most of the fretting lives, over that list small bit of SQ. That was what I was getting at, and I'm saying it. Like the once you get down to a micro-cellular level, the distance between two subatomic particles might as well be relative to the distance between the earth and the moon.
That's it. I chose to buy my 2%-1% in one chunk, instead of spreading it out over various devices and such. That leaves 1% more for other junk like speaker stands, some snake oil, and the various audio tweaks I can't wait to not spend much more money on, lest I find the cost-to-performance ration too much to bear.
I
n the case of the units you mentioned which provide DSP-based corrections (Linn, Lyngdorf, DEQX), that you found superior to much higher priced DACs, was that superiority contributed to by the corrections, or was it true even with the corrections disabled?
Also, which DEQX model were you using?
The HDP-5. It belongs to a guy here in town, and he left me use it for a few weeks in exchange for the DAVE. I thought the DEQX was great, but was probably more reliant on correction over the other two. That doesn't mean "bad." The guy who owns the DEQX has that thing dialed in to perfection, in the smallest dedicated room I've ever been in with full sized speakers (Revel Salon IIs). It sounds like a recording studio in there. As you know, the DEQX has a learning curve and so much you can do with it. It's astounding. Plus, it was the first DAC I tinkered with that had an Ethernet input. When I heard the difference I knew I wanted one, or one like it. When I learned the science of going RJ45, then I knew that I could never go back to USB.
Back to the DIs, though: my pair has 123 hours on them now, and they are sitting on bare stone floors, still without spikes, and these already sound better in my room than any speakers I've had here.
