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In Reply to: RE: +1 - although DSD256 is better at avoiding the artificial smoothness [nt] posted by Chris from Lafayette on November 18, 2020 at 11:30:32
how converting a master to a different format can truly *improve* it.
It can change it, but now you no longer have the original.
Follow Ups:
the reconstruction filter and the group delay; i.e. phase behavior of the DAC.
It isn't about the format, it's how the conversion to analog takes place. When a base PCM signal is transcoded to a very high-rate DSD signal, the out-of-band noise of the delta-sigma modulators is pushed far above the audio band and a very gentle reconstruction filter can be used with good phase response. It doesn't change the original recording, but it does change the way your ear perceives the reproduction of the signal. I'm currently transcoding everything to DSD 128 including low-bit rate internet streams and even broadcast FM and to my ears literally everything sounds better with the simple DSD FIR reconstruction filter in my dac versus just decoding the PCM directly.
also listen to everything in DSD 128, but the Software does the conversion, not the Dac.
You can't access the Dac without Software, can you?
I am using HQPlayer to transcode (upscale) the files to DSD128. HQPlayer has the best delta-sigma modulators on the planet and they far exceed any upsampling in any silicon chip. Most modern DAC chips do have resampler/upsampling modulators built in to them and can perform that task. However, none of them come close to the performance you can attain with a powerful desktop computer running HQPlayer, or provide all the choices for modulators.
If your DAC has the capability, you can set it up to upscale everything to DSD without software, usually with some sort of button on the front of the DAC. Again, most modern chips and DAC implementation allow for this. But there are compromises because of compute power on the DAC chip and software scaling is always preferable.
It isn't about the format, it's how the conversion to analog takes place.
Perhaps, but a recording mastered at Redbook will never have the extension of 24 bit recordings sampled at higher rates no matter how you diddle with it.
If you enjoy the artificial "softening", so be it. Perhaps it's because the Revel has a rising top end response which I don't find desirable.
Courtesy of Stereophile:
in that it seeks to invalidate what I posted AND it insults my choice of speaker as defective.So here's the lecture you begged for with that, I will do my best Abe here and be a know-it-all ass:
My background is EE and I took a year of filter theory, a semester of analog filter design and a semester of discrete time processing. I designed and built an exemplary baseband PCM system for use in our university's communications lab as my senior design project and put that knowledge directly to use as the project manager and system architect. So, I have a background in this stuff, have also done all the math and actually have some experience with it. I'm not just another armchair expert.
Early cd players were criticized fo their terrible sound quality. Why? The Sony 101 didn't use any noise-shaping upsampling it was a 16 bit ladder dac PCM converter with a steep analog filter in the output stage. Those reconstrucion filters messed with phase and sounded bad. Philips first implementation used oversampling with a 14-bit converter and a less steep reconstruction filter at a higher frequency and it did sound better. The loonies diy'ers of the time thought the early 16 bit Philips dac chips of the second generation sounded best with no oversampling at all and a similar more gentle filter. There was eventually a convergence of thought on why all of this was. It was the way that the digital imformation was converted to analog, not the digital data that was making a difference and one of the most important aspects was keeping the output stage reconstruction filter far away from the frequency of the musical content, moving it much higher in frequency so it impacted the musical signal much less. I listened to a Sony CDP-101 in 1982 and is really was terrible.
How important are frequencies above 22kHz? It depends, I suppose because of harmonics. Sampling theory tells us that in a band-limited system like one from 0-22kHz all of the frequency information is preserved when sampling it using known methods. Transient information might be an exception because of harmonics which is what an impulse response is. You can't get it back, no. It is gone and conventional upsampling doesn't interpolate new information it just changes the data format. Why bother? Because we also know that changing the data to a 1 or multi-bit delta or pulse width like DSD allows the use of a simple low-pass filter for reconstruction. There is no discrete DAC needed, just clock the data in and send it through a filter, the best case a really good digital FIR with a gain stage behind it. That isn't smoothing anything. It is preserving the information you have in your original file while moving the filter corner frequency out to such a high frequency and gentle slope that it doesn't sound terrible.
Regarding my speakers, I have run sweeps and built very high quality FIR room correction filters in acourate that provide a frequency response within +-2db from 30Hz-24Khz at my listening position, which is extraordinary real-world performance. Impulse response and interaural coherence coefficient are also quite exceptional with my latest builds.
Edits: 11/20/20
I'm not arguing your precious PC based delta-sigma modulator. I simply called you out for being flat out wrong that "CDs are .wav". 100% undeniably incorrect, Mr EE.As for preferring quality PCM over DSD, that's just my subjective preference. Nothing to argue about here.
Edits: 11/20/20
You invited this sort of snark years ago with your insufferable and seemingly uncontrollable pedantry and one-upsmanship. I think you have illustrated a great many times why you have earned my derision. It wasn't about the .wav error, it was about the 1000 times previously that you jumped into a thread in order to be right about something/anything. Point to Abe. Hurry, go put that on the bedpost of your online life. Its pretty apparent that this is your only form a joy these days.
Speaking for myself, I'm happy when someone who is right (about anything) jumps into a thread! ;-)
So you bring my name into a thread that I have nothing to do with..... as you rant on about your world dominating PC based delta-sigma modulators, supposed EE, and extensive background in filter theory, etc. I don't care. I wasn't part of that thread.Please leave me out of your shit storm. I want no part of it.
Edits: 11/21/20 11/21/20
You're welcome to your own preferences.
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