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Hey Bandrade, in reply to Reply #631
Sounds great, your newer DAC, and I don’t doubt relevance in the analysis you used. At the same time, maybe semantics, but what I read from your posts feels uncomfortably absolute for me: that if a DAC is good enough, impedance match good and voltage output right, these largely determine whether a pre stage can be good or not…. Also, that transparency defines better.
But in a complex system, variables vast, even subtle things can add up to transparency or lack thereof. And what of transparency without musicality...in a truly transparent system wouldn’t lesser recordings sound bad, and medium, mediocre, and good, good. Or, the exact same system, in different rooms, will clearly sound different. And even with the exact same room shape/design, materials, climate, room treatments and system components, then varying power, cables, vibration management, tubes, contact treatment, etc, could make one system much more transparent than the other, creating different starting points for system changes and modifications.
Similarly, in your system/room, I guess you could test a handful of DACs widely considered really good….with admired output stages and internal pres, good impedance matching, good voltage out, good cables….and likely they would all sound notably different, some better and some worse, and for different reasons.
In the same vein, I suspect your mods sound quite different from mine, and Steve’s different again. I don’t know what you did, but though they may work in your ZMA, I could not use Obligato gold caps. Compelling open/articulate mids, but tending to hardness and coolness on music prone to these, whether in my Torii or CSP3 as PS bypasses. Similarly, I can test 5 great sounding resistors that measure very closely, and hear notable changes with each, each doing some things better or worse...Variability from a single part, of a single component, can improve or degrade the whole experience for me. And each part choice changes the others past and future.
Then, especially to get transparency from my CSP3, cables, vibration treatment, gain settings, AND TUBES...all can really change the CSP3 character here. Even after a lot of mods that made all tubes I test more complete, tubes can still make my version of the CSP3 more or less beautiful, especially in terms of resolution/transparency.
Anyway, just looking at how a single part of the chain can impact on the whole, to me illustrates, not irrelevance, but the limitations of theoretical analysis. I agree with the efficacy of keeping good theory in mind, but there are literally thousands of ways for different high quality DACs, and for cumulative modification choices to sound quite different. This to me indicates many, many ways to find synergy in individual components and in system combinations.
Before my long mod cycle, I was seriously tuned in every way, system and room. Loving the sound, keeping everything pretty consistent was easy, establishing a pretty solid reference. My computer/DAC/source was very close to the one that won best digital source for the money, and best digital overall the several times it was shown at RMAF. Then, early in my amp mods, I modified a Gustard x20 Pro, and with the same computer setup in front, it is really, really good, so I feel good about my source, finished more-or-less in spring of 2017.
Then, as a means to keep from falling off track, I really tried to keep Steve’s basic signature balances while increasing transparency and musicality across the spectrum. Though I likely strayed some, relative consistency is not really a choice for me, defined by very sensitive perception/hearing with narrow tolerances. On one end, just enough bass to sound/feel like a real bass, it does not take much excess in the balance, a bit exaggerated and thickened, for fatigue to show up for me. Also, I need bass to balance so it does not mask mids up or overwhelm immediacy. On the other end, within the constraints of the gear, seemingly unlimited upper range helps bring out the fine detail and space I need, but with a pretty serious limitation on hardness in the mids/upper mids/low highs, something that seems easy to get from clarification without really right combinations of parts and wires. Then balance between low and high...excellent detail and quiet enhancing rich textures, spacial information, harmonics...complex throughout, and mids clear enough for darker recordings to sound good, and warm just enough for lean ones to sound like music (with gain riding)…
It takes very little deviation anywhere in the spectrum for it to sound off for me. Back when I was fine-tuning the system to the room with EQ in my player software, even a few tenths of a dB with a very narrow Q was often enough to pull it all together.
So with amp mods, no longer system/room tuning, all changes were based on a system/room standard, working to refine the amps within this foundation. I also worked intentionally for extended periods on the Torii, then shifted for a while to the CSP3, a means to keep relative reference intact. With progressively accumulated breakthroughs from Torii work, there were several times when the CSP3 was really hard to bring up to it. But with determination, and loads of experiments, so far, it has always happened.
Starting with quite useful pre-burnin with a Frybaby2, I mostly did one part, or wire at one time, and if it did not improve the sound, usually in most ways, I tried another. I think needing a single change to be a clear improvement helped keep a thread of improvement, eliminating parts lacking breadth in how they brought beauty. I guess this explains why I have been at this for about two years. With many hundreds of experiments, now maybe 100 parts, wires and cables (amps combined), from input RCAs to outputs, have changed. All I thought improved resolving musicality without degradation.
My goal, either inside gear, or as a whole, is always to get things to where almost all recordings can sound beautiful, and I suspect in many cases, better than they did in mastering rooms used to make them.
These thoughts are just pointing to the variables of how the results can vary pretty widely with similar objectives and theories. With hundreds of different sound choices, and when even one cable can change the character of the whole of a system, I don't understand absolutes about pre stages.
Edit: This is not to say necessarily that Steve's or my modded CSP3 or ZBIT in front of your DAC would be beneficial, but I think it is possible. Also not to say that with or without a pre is better in general. I totally get that in your system and room, with the particular mods you did, that using your CSP3 was finally not as good as without. I can also sort of imagine the possibility that your DAC output might be so good, it may not particularly benefit from any pre stage. But also, I can say, that in my very revealing system, I like two pre stages at this point! Again, maybe semantics, we all find the best we can, and explain it as best we can, but vast variables in complex systems make me nervous about absolutes. That said, I appreciate your thoughts and ideas and I am really glad your efforts got your system as good as it is!
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