Getting the Highs Right.

DAC 62 folks seem to fall into two camps: The high end is just like vinyl or the high end is veiled. Hmmm, discrepancy. What are these vinyl people hearing that the other camp is not hearing?

When I hear that it is veiled, the comparison is almost always other CD players and DACs. When I hear that it is just like vinyl, you guessed it, its from some former Decca lover.

This caused me to pause and try to understand what is happening. Why the phenomena,? Why the duality? And, more importantly, who is right?

Here is my theory. Thanks, no less to mid-fi manufacturers and “The Bunch” (See my previous BLOGs), our ears have been inundated with high end grunge. We are used to the biting, rice krispie crackle of high end digital conversion that passes from our beloved tweeters into the room. We have been conditioned to think that this is what a high end sounds like. So akin are we to this, that when the grunge goes away, we think that some of the high end went with it.

And such was the dilemma facing one Henry Kloss when he first showed us a tape full of hiss, and then a high end compression – expansion appliance crafted by one Ray Dolby. I swore Dolby took away some of the high end of the cassette. I vowed never to use such a thing because I would rather listen to hiss and more high end, then listen to no hiss with some of the music missing.

But that was not the case. Dolby does not remove the music and so neither does a correct conversion process. My new test is that if I am listening to a new DAC and notice some of the high end “veiled”, I now take a closer listen. Perhaps it is the ghost of Henry Kloss.