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Martin Ranger

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  1. Hi Mark (and all others on the thread), I have been looking at active crossovers with or without room correction, too, and the deqx has been pretty high on my list. Have you found and tried a pro-audio alternative to it, yet? Sorry for warming up this old thread, Martin
  2. I think we are getting in the right direction with this discussion. Double blind testing is scientific method which in itself is a valid form of testing and gives (probabilistic) answers. The key to its success, however, is correct implementation, which includes changing only one variable and applying the result to the correct situation. The big problem when using ABX to look for differences in audio equipment is that this is difficult and often the results might be meaningless. The main difficulty is that the perception of differences in audio equipment depends on both the existence of these differences and the ability of the test person to perceive them. Since it is impossible to separate these two things in the test design we are in a bind. In particular, there is a bias towards rejecting the hypothesis that there is a difference. Let's assume that we have one test person and we switch one component repeatedly. If that person hears a difference, we can say with a certain probability that the components sound different in this particular set-up. This does not mean that it will sound different in my set-up though, but for scientific purposes that doesn't matter. It might however be the case that the components sound different and the test person cannot hear the difference in the particular test set-up, giving us a false rejection of the hypothesis that there is a difference. To get around this, we can use a (very) large group of people doing the same test. This helps us in increasing the confidence that if nobody hears a difference there is no audible difference in the particular test set-up, as the probability that none of our test subjects has "good ears" decreases in the sample size. In a sense our bias gets smaller. This does, however, not mean that I can also hear the difference in my system. Of course, the test subjects have to be isolated. Four guys sitting in my listening room while I change cables behind a cardboard box is not going to do it. Plus, we really need DOUBLE blindness, that is the tester either has no contact whatsoever with the test person, or she is blind, too. So, bearing this in mind, ABX is a valid tool in theory, but seems quite difficult to implement in practice for audio comparison. Moreover, Lost was great until the cop-out of a final episode. Martin
  3. I have owned the AA DAC 1 Mk.4 pretty much since it came out, and while I have not had the opportunity to compare it to the BADA, I completely agree with your description of the AA's sonic signature. The smoothness of the DAC is very much at home in a solid-state setup or as in my case with a passice pre-amp and the EVS M500, which are ICSpower amps built by Ric Schultz. For a while I had it in a system with a tube pre-amp, but I vastly prefered the passive pre-amp set-up, for exactly the reasons Carlo mentions. Now, my personal preference is more towards the solid-state sound, so someone who loves tubes might be very happy with the AA in a tube set-up. Anyway, just wanted to confirm Carlo's findings. Martin
  4. Since this is my first post here, what I am about to do might be a bit unfortunate, so if there is a problem, please delete it. Having said that, I think the DIY Audio link that was posted and deleted is a valuable resource. At least it was for me when I was looking for USB-SPDIF converters. So here it comes again: http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/digital-source/153191-m2tech-hiface-usb-spdif-24-192khz-asynch.html This 35-page long exchange contains a lot of information about modding the HiFace down to replacing the clock. While there is a link to someone who is offering some of the mods, anyone who knows their way around a soldering iron can do these mods. Sorry if this post is inappropriate. Martin Disclaimer: I just bought a modded HiFace, based on the comments at the DIY Audio discussion.
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