How many commercial recordings are available in DSD format? And from those, what percentage is pure DSD, never having been converted to PCM and back to DSD at some point?
I think you already know the answer to that question
How many commercial recordings are available in DSD format? And from those, what percentage is pure DSD, never having been converted to PCM and back to DSD at some point?
I think you already know the answer to that question
As I am including SACDs I do not have the faintest idea. And I am really interested in an exact answer, because Devialet's do not accept DSD format and as far as I know do not consider it a priority ...
Ok, you can help me out in my lack of knowledge here. Is DSD & SACD not one & the same?Delivery where? I do not know if the processing DSD bits see is the same that SACD uses by the time it gets to the DAC;
If DSD & SACD are the same then this is a mute point, no?I would be surprised if the ECR and digital filtering is the same but do not know.
Don, you already put in the proviso on this statement & a very big proviso it is "all else equal" & in this "all else" you mentioned timing, filters. I think that you might be misunderstanding what was done here & I should have picked it up earlier - both the SACD stream & the DSD stream from HDD are both being processed by the same DAC. AFAIK, so your citing of different PSRR, CMRR, etc is mute.On the output side, delivery of the correct bits does not mean the analog output is "good", but it should be the same if the input bits are the same.
By your statements earlier, I thought you understood that there is more to it than bit-identical files so I'm now confused with your latest post?So I'm not sure why you have now I think I am not following so by definition must be "blinkered".
Of course you can contribute & I appreciate your expertise & would appreciate your involvement!I don't think I can contribute to this discussion but it is interesting to watch.
I understand. I believe your expertise is in the field of computers, forgive me if I'm wrong or defining it as something lesser.Yes, I am confused, and we are crossing wires here, my bad. I do not know the difference, if any, between DSD and SACD, especially at the DAC inputs. Sorry I did not make that clear. My background is not audio, this is just a hobby. I did not look up DSD and SACD formats; one reason I need to stay out of this discussion.
Ah, I thought we were already addressing this earlier - timing (jitter), CM noise at the inputs. Both of these can vary & yet the streams remain bit identical. Both of these differences will result in different analogue outputs. That is why I was so interested in Bruce's null test & any difference file he might have!"All else equal", yes, a thorny concept. However, if the bits at the DAC's inputs are identical for the two sources shouldn't the output be the same? What is non-deterministic?
My thinking is as above - other differences in the digital stream besides differences in bits.I was thinking there must be some difference in signal processing, whether due to input transceivers, clock generation/recovery, filters applied, whatever between the DSD input and SACD input to the system to cause the bits at the DAC to be different. Is that what you are thinking? If so, we agree, and "bit identical" from the source means little because the signal path to the DAC is different. If that assumption is wrong, and identical bits at the DAC cause different outputs, I am at a loss to explain it save for external effects on the DAC and analog chain.
No problem.Sorry, I feel I jumped into the middle of this without really knowing where it's been and where it's going. - Don
Thanks, Bruce
So the Sonoma can play DSD files & Playback designs handle the DSD files, natively - no need for USB packaging!
The one proviso in your null test is that you are introducing an analogue to digital conversion stage & this might mask some differences or cause variations in the results.
Have you had much success with null tests in other comparisons where the difference signal was effectively null i.e you conducted a control to test that your null tests work as expected?
Have you done the same null test with CD & the same file ripped to .WAV on disk?
Are you considering to shrink your system down to a Devialet? It has to be impressively good
I wish I may listen to one, sometimes...
The answer to that can be found over at SA-CD.net
Bruce,
Thanks - but I could only find the number of releases in SACD - no general statistics about percentage of pure DSD recordings.
Bruce, is there a link to a technical description of the DAC unit you used?
We've done null tests here for years with CD's burned at different speeds with different media. We've done the same with CD and the files did null down to around -80dB or so. Figured it was just noise/dither.