Can we wield a little logic scalpel for a moment? The original source points out that there is no obvious technological mechanism by which bit-identical files might differ with respect to their playback - although the writer has overlooked fragmentation altering HD behaviour and therefore ground plane noise.
He does appear to trust his instincts, or underestimate subjective biasing, more than I'd be comfortable with - but who honestly can throw the first stone in that regard? We're a long way from understanding perception, and we can't rule out advances in our comprehension of sound reproduction either. There's no room for arrogance. There's also no evidence here of spin doctoring: who benefits commercially from the suggestion that a slow, obsolete CD-ROM is better than a new one? There is, however, among some respondents, a 'software' mentality that ignores, or is unaware of, the fundamentals of digital audio, and a sneaky equation of audio devices with computer peripherals that is rhetorical subterfuge. Bits don't 'rot', but storage is not the same as real-time processing. Displaying pixels on your monitor is not time-sensitive, and a printer is not voltage-sensitive. Clocks, DACs and amplifiers are both. A PC is largely agnostic to its playback environment: an audio system is not. You may have noticed that computers are not built with vacuum tubes so much these days: but for audio electronics they remain quite a good idea: the design goals are different. -- item_audio ------------------------------------------------------------------------ item_audio's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=51315 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=93549 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/audiophiles
