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Depends which component, maybe speakers or headphones, but there seem to be top-quality open-source DACs that are very cheap to assemble or buy assembled. A goo

by dmos62 8y ago

Depends which component, maybe speakers or headphones, but there seem to be top-quality open-source DACs that are very cheap to assemble or buy assembled. A google search should turn them up. Last time I researched it, I found the headphone DAC that I'd buy if I wanted one, but I can't find it now. It had an interesting story around it. It was released anonymously in a blog and then suddenly, after posting dozens of posts per year, the author just dropped off the grid. No one knows what happened to him. When one of the parts went out of production, others made modifications and rehosted the source, even though the original author did not want derivative works, but that kind of gets voided when the original author is, for all intents and purposes, not on this planet anymore.

paulmd 8y ago
That's NwAvGuy and the ODAC/O2 units. I think "audiophile grade" is an ill-defined target there. You can get headphones like the Superlux HD668B for practically nothing (they were running under $30 at one point), and they sound pretty damned good for a pair of $30 headphones. When I was a kid you paid $30 for a pair of crappy discman headphones let alone a nice pair of over-ear. Meanwhile you've got the name brand Audio Technica and AKG sets running $100-200 thanks to moving production to China. I kind of think people are under-selling just how cheap the "95% solutions" have become nowadays. The really exotic gear made in smaller runs and with meticulous quality control is still expensive, because that's inherently expensive to do, but the consumer-grade stuff has really moved up in quality and down in price. At this point if you're paying thousands of dollars for audio gear, you're either chasing that last 5% of quality, or you're buying a name and a placebo effect, or both.
- hvidgaard 8y ago
  Right on point. It's a difficult topic to navigate in. Most of what you buy in stores are the name, royalties, and R&D of digital circuits and a complex new IoT interface. For true audiophile gear you pay for them to individually test each and every component. Only select the ones that match, and for the overall circuitry to work as expected. All that manual labor to get the last 5% is very expensive, and completely irrelevant for the vast majority of people. They're going to stream their music from an inferior source anyway.
- ghaff 8y ago
  I have good but not audiophile-level gear at home which has been incrementally added to or replaced over the years. TBH, if I were starting over today for whatever reason, I'd probably buy some Sonos equipment or something along those lines and call it a day.
- jsight 8y ago
  I agree with you, and really wonder if amelius was saying the same thing. The price/quality has improved tremendously, but the price/"audiophile brand" hasn't.

by dmos62 8y ago

paulmd 8y ago

That's NwAvGuy and the ODAC/O2 units. I think "audiophile grade" is an ill-defined target there. You can get headphones like the Superlux HD668B for practically nothing (they were running under $30 at one point), and they sound pretty damned good for a pair of $30 headphones. When I was a kid you paid $30 for a pair of crappy discman headphones let alone a nice pair of over-ear. Meanwhile you've got the name brand Audio Technica and AKG sets running $100-200 thanks to moving production to China. I kind of think people are under-selling just how cheap the "95% solutions" have become nowadays. The really exotic gear made in smaller runs and with meticulous quality control is still expensive, because that's inherently expensive to do, but the consumer-grade stuff has really moved up in quality and down in price. At this point if you're paying thousands of dollars for audio gear, you're either chasing that last 5% of quality, or you're buying a name and a placebo effect, or both.

hvidgaard 8y ago
Right on point. It's a difficult topic to navigate in. Most of what you buy in stores are the name, royalties, and R&D of digital circuits and a complex new IoT interface. For true audiophile gear you pay for them to individually test each and every component. Only select the ones that match, and for the overall circuitry to work as expected. All that manual labor to get the last 5% is very expensive, and completely irrelevant for the vast majority of people. They're going to stream their music from an inferior source anyway.
ghaff 8y ago
I have good but not audiophile-level gear at home which has been incrementally added to or replaced over the years. TBH, if I were starting over today for whatever reason, I'd probably buy some Sonos equipment or something along those lines and call it a day.
jsight 8y ago
I agree with you, and really wonder if amelius was saying the same thing. The price/quality has improved tremendously, but the price/"audiophile brand" hasn't.