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Re: RAKK dac Mk II is here!!!!!!!!!!! Is new necessarily good?

Thank you for answering so swiftly Glassbottles. As you have heard the new DAC and compared it to the earlier one, as well as the DCS Elgar, I can borrow your ears. I will accept your experience and most probably go ahead and acquire the new DAC.

However, if I take your other comments as generalisations, rather than specifically referring to Kevin Carter's production (and here you obviously have much more knowledge than I do), I would have to express some doubt about such a generalisation. In fact new products, in my experience, are not all that often better products sound-wise. They are often simply cheaper or smaller, and therefore more easy to sell.

You may well be right about Kevin Carter's research. I am also sure most hifi creators are tying to make some sort of an improvement when they bring out a new model.
However, I am in contact here with a local producer of DIY products, and he tells me that there is a constant need to bring out new products. He has been producing amps for the high-end DIY market for many years, and he tells me that after about 5 years, the sales tail-off, if you do not introduce a new model. He always tries to introduce a model that is as good as his previous ones, but that cost slightly less, or is more easy to house (he makes no such compromise on his huge horn-speakers however. He tells me that the physics simply don't permit it).
He told me quite frankly that his previous models were just as good, even if the technology might be different. In some ways his new products are better, they take up less space while sounding about as good; but it would not be true to say they were better in all aspects.

There are also fashions and trends that we can see if we look back. Was all change for the better?
Most valve addicts will not think that the transistor was a progress in all ways (except for the size and convenience), and yet there would probably have been a time when a hifi person would have been more likely to choose the pseudonym "Transistor-head" rather than "Glassbottle".
The humble Phillips chip TDA1541 DAC that was swiftly scorned and replaced with one bit and then higher rate sampling appears to be all the rage at present.
Tentlabs, and several others have brought out DIY CDPs using this technology with no sampling and no filtering (the theory of less-is-more).

There appear to be followers of both types of technology. Some DIYers are buying into both, OS and NOS, because they claim there are advantages in both.

I would certainly hope that the RAKK DAC is more musical than the DCS Elgar. I had the (mis)-fortune of hearing one in Paris linked to a top of the range Cello or Mark Levinson (I don't remember which) connected to the top of the range Jean-Marie Reynaud speakers; and frankly I have never heard anything so unmusical. There was plenty of detail, but the instruments were separately appearing at each loud speaker unit, the threads of the music completely disappeared in this sliced-up view of things.

I was relieved when I could get back to my 16x2 portable through my valve system into the ELS 57s. Indeed, this was the reason that I began to think that too much OS might be detrimental to sound. (I also had a short spell with an East-sound E-5 that has rave reports and that was rapidly seen off as thick and slow in sound next to my 16x2 player.)

As a person who finds his tweaked Garrard 301, tweaked valve system and tweaked ELS superior to such a top-of-the range transistor system, I can't really accept that change and progress-in-sound must necessarily be associated.

I am sure you were not really saying that, so please do excuse my argument. However, I do feel strongly about this question. Many people do believe that new is better.
Anthony




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  • Re: RAKK dac Mk II is here!!!!!!!!!!! Is new necessarily good? - 13D3Tube 03/19/0702:31:06 03/19/07 (0)

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