Dipping feet into DSD pool...

Rayooo

Rayooo

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Apr 5, 2013
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Funny how when I "standardized" on FLAC.. I had the silly notion It could be a single high-rez format I could live with for "years".
well, I guess I got a year out of it, then the WAV vs FLAC hub-bub, then Apple Lossless etc.etc. and now DSD. :exciting:

In the end, trying other formats (until now) was easy.

I also recall messing around with SACD a few years ago. Try as I might, either by luck or as I've been told "poor choices" on my part, It never was to my liking. Don't I recall reading reports on how bad DSD was for a disk format back then? Maybe not.

Anyway, I downloaded a "DSD" from Channel Classics today. copied it over to the Synology NAS, told J-River to play DSDs..and I'm listening now.

The bad news is, for this "foot dipping" I'm going to need new hardware. Looks like no chance whatsoever that my D-07X will ever do DSD over USB. Oh well, I knew I should have kept my old dusty W4S DAC-2. (I hope those W4S guys get some credit for updating the DAC-2)

So, at the moment, I'm listening to the DSD sampler via J-River. of course, the DSD stream is being "transcoded" to PCM for playback. Any "bit rate" greater than 192K (i.e. DSD) is converted to 192k PCM. seems to work well... so far.

I guess if this test is successful, the next move will be a new DAC with DSD-USB... and then I'll have a digital library consisting of FLAC, WAV, DSD..and then whatever the next format is that blows DSD away.

heaven help me. :(
 
Rayooo said:
Funny how when I "standardized" on FLAC.. I had the silly notion It could be a single high-rez format I could live with for "years".
well, I guess I got a year out of it, then the WAV vs FLAC hub-bub, then Apple Lossless etc.etc. and now DSD. :exciting:

In the end, trying other formats (until now) was easy.

I also recall messing around with SACD a few years ago. Try as I might, either by luck or as I've been told "poor choices" on my part, It never was to my liking. Don't I recall reading reports on how bad DSD was for a disk format back then? Maybe not.

Anyway, I downloaded a "DSD" from Channel Classics today. copied it over to the Synology NAS, told J-River to play DSDs..and I'm listening now.

The bad news is, for this "foot dipping" I'm going to need new hardware. Looks like no chance whatsoever that my D-07X will ever do DSD over USB. Oh well, I knew I should have kept my old dusty W4S DAC-2. (I hope those W4S guys get some credit for updating the DAC-2)

So, at the moment, I'm listening to the DSD sampler via J-River. of course, the DSD stream is being "transcoded" to PCM for playback. Any "bit rate" greater than 192K (i.e. DSD) is converted to 192k PCM. seems to work well... so far.

I guess if this test is successful, the next move will be a new DAC with DSD-USB... and then I'll have a digital library consisting of FLAC, WAV, DSD..and then whatever the next format is that blows DSD away.

heaven help me. :(
Click to expand...

It's so hard to keep up. I remember thinking 24/96 was going to be it! Ha!

We are still seeing quite a few new SACD releases. I was trying to do a count on Amazon this morning, but gave up after about 300 new releases in 2013. There could be over a thousand for all I know.

I hope you enjoy your foray into DSD. It can be a very rewarding sonic experience and I guess as long as direct DSD downloads and SACD's continue...then DSD will rise in popularity.

Mike
 
First issue is that it looks like Metadata is not properly stored and/or retrieved in DSD???

...stored DSD on NAS, updated Metadata with player #1. All fine.

Started player #2, It found the new album, but, no metadata imported.

This technique works perfectly with FLAC (not WAV of course) ...when the 2nd player auto-imports a new album, it "reads" key metadata fields and applies to it's own local library.

Should this in fact work the same with DSD? Or, another way of asking: do Tags get stored within a DFF file similar to how they do with FLAC?
 
It is my understanding that DFF files do not store meta data. You want DSF files. They do store meta data.
 
Ah, I see, looks like the download format from Channel Classics is DFF.

I've since used JRMC to change the downloaded DSD tracks to 192k PCM/FLAC.
That of course worked fine.

I guess until I get a proper DSD-DAC, I might just as well not get my feet too wet.



Mike said:
It is my understanding that DFF files do not store meta data. You want DSF files. They do store meta data.
Click to expand...
 
Problem with DSD, there are not so many things to listen to: ....
There are only 5,000 albums out there to record with DSD, and DSD dac is still too expensive.
 
I'll give you the point for lack of (good) content.

But come on now... You mean the $149 Loki is too expensive?
 
Rayooo said:
Ah, I see, looks like the download format from Channel Classics is DFF.

I've since used JRMC to change the downloaded DSD tracks to 192k PCM/FLAC.
That of course worked fine.

I guess until I get a proper DSD-DAC, I might just as well not get my feet too wet.
Click to expand...

Better if you transcode to 176.
 
-E- said:
I'll give you the point for lack of (good) content.

But come on now... You mean the $149 Loki is too expensive?
Click to expand...

Yeah, there are also the Geek Pulse that decode DSD and come with headphone out and also headphone out balance! It's now 299$, which I think cheap when you add a Modi/Magni into the combo.
 
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