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Why are digital streaming equipment manufacturers refusing to answer me?

I have performed double blind tests with the most highly regarded brands of streamers and some hifi switches. None have made any difference to my system on files saved locally. I have asked the following question to the makers of such systems and almost all have responded with marketing nonsense. 
My system uses fiber optic cables. These go all the way to the dac (MSB). Thus no emi or rfi is arriving at the dac. On top of this, MSB allows me to check if I receive bit perfection files or not. I do. 
So I claim that: if your dac receives a bit perfect signal and it is connected via fiber optic, anything prior to the conversion to fiber optic (streamers, switches, their power supplies, cables etc) make absolutely no difference. Your signal can’t be improved by any of these expensive pieces of equipment. 
If anyone can help explain why this is incorrect I would greatly appreciate it. Dac makers mostly agree, makers of streamers have told me scientific things such as “our other customers can hear the difference” (after extensive double blind testing has resulted to no difference being perceived) and my favorite “bit perfect doesn’t exist, when you hear our equipment tou forget about electronics and love the music”!
mihalis
audio2design
1,351 posts
 
No trolling here jjss49, calling it exactly as I see it.  The op, at least as stated in their post, created a system that is electrically isolated.  It is also bit perfect (like most home networks).  There is no timing information in the signal .... and he did not hear any difference between streamers, exactly as would be expected because he created a situation where, short of data manipulation, there is no difference. It is not rocket science to pull data off a storage mechanism and serve it up on a data link without bit errors.

Note the author is also using an MSB DAC. I think we can agree that MSB is a competent enough company to design a DAC that does not experience any noise pumping from data arrival. It's not hard thing to do.

So, given the scenario that the op has presented, assuming no data manipulation in the streamer, the only logical and reasoned conclusion is that there is no difference as there is no mechanism to create a difference.

However, as expected, even in the face of a solidly presented case, it is a given that some posters will jump on their keyboards and attack the ops listening abilities or some other facet of what was done.  Was I wrong?
thyname's avatar
thyname
3,107 posts
 
Oh please... MSB DAC for you 🙄. Now tell me why DACs matter and why anyone can be happy enough with a $50 DAC from China 🙄
electroslacker
375 posts
 
If "A" reveals 8 out of 10 words of a lyric and "B" reveals 10 out of 10 words of a lyric, then an A/B test will let you hear all 10 words on A and B. 

There is an assumption that the human ear/mind system is a skilled comparator of sound, but it was designed to interpret and learn-- not compare.
mapman's avatar
mapman
21,879 posts
 
If someone answers the question to your satisfaction, they are probably just humoring you.   So I would not lose any sleep over this unless what you are using does not sound good. 
kijanki's avatar
kijanki
4,410 posts
 
So I claim that: if your dac receives a bit perfect signal and it is connected via fiber optic, anything prior to the conversion to fiber optic (streamers, switches, their power supplies, cables etc) make absolutely no difference.
It is simply not true.  Fiber optics transmitters are slow - about 10x slower than coax drivers.  System electrical noise makes those light transitions noisy (jagged), that in effect results on receiving end as a variation in the moment of level recognition (threshold) - a timing jitter.  This jitter translates pretty much to noise added to music.  That's why most often coax works better than Toslink.  You might not hear the difference because your DAC has very good jitter rejection, because your system has limited resolution, or simply because your hearing is not that good  (mine is getting worse).  Whatever the reason is - blanket statements are never useful.
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