Tagged: digital sources
10 articles we've published with this tag.
Six-figure DACs: what the money actually buys over a good $2,000 boxI've compared statement DACs costing more than a car against a good $2,000 unit. Here's where the extra money genuinely goes, and where it doesn't.By Sofia Laurent- Why your streamer's output stage still shapes the sound at the speakerBits are bits, but the analogue stage after the DAC chip in your streamer still colours what your speakers do. Here's what actually matters.By Hannah Reid
- MQA is dead. Here's what that actually means for your streaming serviceMQA's collapse left a lot of confused shelves of "Masters" tier subscriptions. Here's what actually changed, and what to do about it.By Priya Anand
- Bit-perfect and PCM vs DSD: which digital format claims actually matterDSD, MQA, bit-perfect, hi-res PCM — Nell Shaw sorts which digital audio format claims genuinely change what you hear and which are marketing noise.By Eleanor Shaw
- Network streamers and vinyl: why I finally stopped fighting the digital sidePriya Anand spent years dismissing streamers as beside the point. Here's what changed her mind — and what a good digital source actually does for a valve-based system.By Priya Anand
Streamers under $500: do you really need to spend more?Dave Okafor asks whether budget network streamers can genuinely hold their own against pricier rivals — and what you actually lose if you don't spend up.By Dave Okafor- Digital volume control vs analogue: which actually degrades your signal?Digital volume attenuation has a bad reputation, but is it deserved? Theo Mensah separates the real maths from the folklore.By Theo Mensah
- USB audio drivers and async transfer: what your DAC is actually doing with your computerUSB audio is more complex than a simple cable swap. Nell Shaw breaks down drivers, transfer modes and what actually matters for headphone listeners connecting a DAC to a computer.By Eleanor Shaw
NAD's C 589 CD player revives MQA with QRONO d2a processing and an ESS Sabre DACNAD's C 589 CD player pairs MQA Labs' QRONO d2a reconstruction technology with an ESS Sabre DAC — here's what that means for serious listeners.By Theo Mensah
Four million taps: inside Chord's £25,000 Quartet FPGA upscalerChord's new Quartet runs four million WTA filter taps across five FPGAs and adds a built-in ADC. Theo Mensah explains what FPGA reconstruction actually does.By Theo Mensah