The Sad Life of an Audiophile

Part One: A New Way

Arguably the most debilitating aspect of an audiophile's life lies in its fiscal drain on one's resources. Being an audiophile is expensive. Decent speakers with anything approaching a full range really cannot be had for much under $2,000. Add to that a good front end and the required electronics and you are at at least $5,000. Mind you, this is pretty much the minimum. Prices go up from there.

I have recently had something of a realization on the road to Damascus. Good audio, and I mean REALLY good audio, does not have to cost anywhere near this much. In fact, my current main system costs $647. I think it is the best sound I have ever heard. What can provide this miracle? Headphones. Modern headphones are insanely good for shockingly reasonable prices. I bought a set of Koss Pro 4As in 1973 for $79. In today's money that would be over $400. My reference phones are now the PSB M4 U1. These cans cost $229.

Remember, I said $647? Well, I added to the PSB an external DAC, the $169 Audioengine D1, and I plug the PSB into an external headphone amp, the $249 Schiit Asgard 2. My front end for this setup is an ordinary laptop computer I already had and is used mostly for other things, so I didn't include this in the total price. I simply play high bitrate MP3s on my computer to which I connect the Audioengine via USB. A standard RCA cable runs from the Audioengine to the Schiit into which I plug the PSB headphones.

The sound quality is breathtaking. It sounds studio quality to me, and I couldn't be happier.

Part Two: What Matters and What Doesn't

In addition to cost, another pitfall of being an audiophile is that the audiophile press is rancid with corruption and superstition. The plain fact is that other than digital audio (CDs and streaming music), there has not been a substantial advancement in audio technology for 30-40 years (Many of the current cause célèbres--vinyl records and tube amps--are based on technology going back to the 1950s.). It is generally held that some of the best speakers ever arrived on the market in the 1970s and 1980s. Think of the $50,000 Infinity IRS V or the Quad electrostatic. The Apogee Scintilla ribbon speaker was released 32 years ago. Apogee shut its doors in 1999. The Yamaha V-FET range of amplifiers sold through the late 70s and early 80s and are still prized for their tube-like sound.

However, selling audio gear is a business so manufacturers have to keep coming up with new reasons for enthusiasts to buy their products and for the audiophile press to write about them. This has spawned an enormous about of nonsense. Let me share with you what I think matters and doesn't matter.

1. Bit rates: Does matter, a lot. A 128 KB MP3 does not sound very good, but a 256 KB and above MP3 sounds very good. It is not quite indistinguishable from the CD source (you'll need a lossless FLAC file for that), but it is very good.
3. High Resolution digital audio: Doesn't matter. CD technology is based on a 44 kHz sampling rate and 16 bits of dynamic range. Neil Young believes that CD sound loses something compared to old fashioned analog sound (true) and that the cause of this is insufficient resolution (not true). He and others champion a 192 kHz/24 bit format. I have listened to this and I can't tell any difference between this and CD's 44/16 format. In fact, in some cases it seems to sound worse
4. External DAC: Does matter, a little. Adding an external DAC to a computer can slightly improve the sound quality. I wouldn't call the difference dramatic, but it is audible and, I think, worth the money.
5. External Headphone Amp: Does matter, a little. Just like the DAC it can make a small but audible difference to the sound.
6. Headphones: Does matter, a lot. Which headphone you use will have a large impact on the sound quality. In fact, after the type of digital audio you choose, this will have the single biggest impact on sound quality.
7. USB cable: Does matter, a little. This one floors me and I have no explanation for it. When I replaced the short USB cable that came with my DAC with a cheap, off-the-shelf 10 foot USB cable, all of the weaknesses of CD sound--sterile, clinical, emotionally uninvolving reproduction--reappeared. Oddly, I have tried two high-end USB cables from AudioQuest and Kimber and niether sounds as good as the ordinary looking cable that came with the DAC.

Part Three: My Latest Journey

As I mentioned at the outset, I have recently discovered an absurdly cost effective way to get audiophile quality sound. I was so pleased with what I heard because not only did the music provide extremely high resolution, but it reminded me of the way music sounded back in the analog days. There was something about it that was just more enjoyable. It was emotionally involving, unfatiguing sound that regularly inspired toe-tapping immersion in a way that standard CD music has not done for me in years. I have no technical explanation for this. Perhaps, it is a reduction in jitter that asynchronous USB provides. Perhaps it is the direct digital playback a computer provides, compared to a laser reading digital data off of the rapidly spinning disc. I just don't know.

Based on this experience with my $647 package, I convinced myself that more was better. I went searching for an upgrade (the eternal audiophile quest). After a lot of research, I decided on the $400 PM-3 Oppo headphones and the $600 Schiit Bifrost Multibit DAC. The PM-3s arrived first, so I plugged them into the Asgard 2 in eager anticipation. I was shocked. They sounded worse--in fact, considerably worse--than the PSBs. I had been hoodwinked by the audiophile press yet again. They exhibited less detail, a flabbier bass, reduced clarity, and a seemingly rolled off top end. The difference wasn't subtle. For a good review that reaches the same conclusion from someone whose judgment I trust (mostly because he often just simply says "I can't hear any difference"), see this comparison. Needless to say, I was very disappointed.

The next day the Schiit Bifrost arrived. Again, I plugged it in with eager anticipation. This time, the result was different. I didn't hear much difference at all. At first, I thought that the Bifrost sounded the same as the D1, but after painstakingly going back-and-forth between the two with music with which I am very familiar I ultimately decided that I preferred the Audioengine D1. The problem with the Schiit DAC was that the sound lost a slight amount of you-are-there-in-the-same-room realism. The $169 Audioengine just sounded more vivid and lifelike. Don't get me wrong. Unlike the headphone comparison, this difference was fairly subtle, bit it was definitely there. There are some practical advantages to the Audioengine as well. In addition to being less than 1/3 the price, it is much smaller and truly portable since it draws its power from the USB connection. More importantly, it has its own volume control. The Schiit pretty much has to be used with an external headphone amp because it has no volume control.

My conclusions? First, you should definitely audition a headphone before buying one. It will have by far the biggest effect on the overall sound, and, just like speakers, the differences between headphones can be large. I would be surprised if there were another set of headphones in the sub-$1000 category that sound better than the PSBs, but obviously I haven't heard them all. The improvements made by an external DAC and headphone amp are real but not dramatic. Get a good set of cans and you are 80% of the way there. The PSBs sound better than they have a right to plugged directly into the computer's sound card. Fortunately, you can get really good DACs and amps for a surprisingly small cost. I am sure that there are other combinations that sound great, but I can personally vouch for the Audioengine D1/Asgard 2 combo.

Edit: I thought that perhaps I heard something this evening and so I began a lengthy test to determine if, indeed, there was an audible difference between CD sound and MP3@256k. After much back-and-forth with several recordings I have decided that there is. There is a lack of energy and presence in the high-end with MP3 that I do not hear with the CD original. The difference is subtle and requires a very good sound system to appreciate, but it is definitely there.

This means that I am going to have to go back and rip all of my music again and save it in FLAC format. In comparing FLAC to the original uncompressed WAV I could not hear any difference. This makes sense in so far as FLAC is a lossless format.

The problem with this is that the difference is small and without blind A/B testing I can never be sure that the placebo effect is not coloring my perceptions. So the bottom line is that FLAC is the recommended format. I say this because even if it is no better than high bitrate MP3 it certainly isn't worse and it is only hard disc space. Thus, it probably helps and certainly cannot hurt.

If you already have an audiophile quality main system (speakers, pre amp, and power amp) then you can use use laptop as the front end for this. You don't need headphones. Of course, this removes the affordability of the system, but it improves the sound compared to a CD player front end.