The sound quality from DACs - is it all the same?

@cd318, the difficult part is getting the people who know how to implement audio reproduction to accept that "perfect" does not mean "good sound", and the people who don't implement audio (but think they do) to accept the other side actually knows what they are doing.

My background is in solid state physics and material sciences. If you need someone to build a battery for you from scratch I am your guy. My background and tools I have access to could allow me to completely simulate an acoustic absorber, but I still hired an acoustic engineer to design my listening room. I could literally build a transistor from scratch, but I trusted the engineers who designed my electronics know what they are doing since that is not what I specialize in. I am an innate skeptic, but my experience and others demonstrated knowledge leads me to believe those who can demonstrate real expertise as opposed to those who claim it by virtue of simply using something.

The why not take it for a test drive sounds like a good idea. Works on the track. Then you have to accept that a car that "feels fast" may not deliver the best lap times. If you are racing "feels fast" does not get you on the podium. What are you goals, feelings or results?

I have an Echo feeding an older amp and speakers in the bunkie at our cottage. Dead silent surprisingly and there are no obvious artifacts.

@nonoise, to use the typical trope since you haven’t listened to it how would you know how it sounds? That works boh ways. I tried it after reading a review on some site that showed good performance. I was surprised.

@jssmith I think mine is a 3rd generation.

@jjss49 ,

Maybe someone needs to put an Echo Dot in an aluminum case ship it with a special power supply and sell it for $2499.99. What do you think the response would be then?

@kcleveland 

My headphones have distortion <<0.01%.  I am not sure there is any speaker made with distortion that low. My DAC and headphone amplifier have far lower distortion than that.  No speaker and amp you have is going to be more revealing.

I am not amazed when there are no difference between DACs, interconnects, or what is streaming the digital signal. There is no reason for the difference to be there.