More buys more

Reviewer: Srajan Ebaen
Financial interests: click here
Desktop system: Source: HP Z2 work station Win11/64 w. Audirvana Studio, Qobuz Sublime & Spotify Premium Lossless; USB bridge: Singxer SU-2; DAC/preamp; COS D1; Amplifiers: Topping B200; Speakers: Virtual Hifi Viper; Headamp: Kinki Studio THR-1;  Headphones: Final D-8000, aune SR7000, FiiO FT7

If we can't afford to spend more, we might hold to a belief that anything more becomes all about bling. Meanwhile we play at the sharp edge of highest return. We're the smart ones. The rest are marks. Conflating material belongings with self worth and spending power with achievement and social standing are common by-products of capitalist consumerism. If there's an afterlife where we sit in judgment of our own incarnation just completed—an unflinching life review based on accessing the full Akashic memory records of it—will the zip code we lived in or the car we drove factor in our assessment? Doubtful, huh? Whilst we're still here giving a toss about such things, a recent hardware reshuffle in anticipation of a pending review created an unexpected op to briefly riff on the 'more buys more' promise. Out had come my €3'250 iFi iDSD Pro Signature DAC/pre, in gone the €10K COS Engineering D1. With their 'perfect' measurements, the high-feedback Topping B200 monos with what I assume are discrete opamps with multiple nested loops have no discernible personality. What precedes them can act more unperturbed as sonic steering wheel. Any course correction translates with obviousness. So what more does more buy us?

First what it doesn't. No headphone ports. No DSD. No real-time resampling of PCM to DSD1'024. No miniature tubes with two feedback modes. No LAN. No clock input. No half-width lowrider chassis to slip into a tidy desktop install. With so many 'no', the smart money is already off to far greener pastures. Wherein brines this pickle. These sonic differences require appreciation when as a DAC/pre with analog volume, I can't play it any louder than I already do the smaller one. It also won't go lower since that's set by the speakers. The smart money that's just about out the door happily cackles "what else is there" as they alight on the street where a small Kia followed by a heavy Merc thunder past at the same 150km/h. Ask the Kia driver to swap cars and repeat the same stretch of windy coastal road. We all know what he'll say in the end. Translate that into audiophile lingo. Et voilà. Prior to motoring a set of wheels wildly beyond his reach, our small-car chap hadn't had the experience. He just nursed assumptions and attitude. Will this experience reset his desires? It'll depend on what kind of driving he does; whether he enjoys the act of driving or merely sees it as a menial task to get from A to B. It'll depend on whether he travels on poorly maintained flat country lanes with cattle crossings and lots of rain; or pristine mountain twisties in sunny Italy.

With road/weather conditions standing in for recording/music complexities, you see where this is headed. Puttering down a gravelled backroad in 2nd gear won't really show off a premium ride's superior handling and responsiveness. But we should already notice more comfort traversing pot holes and rutted irregularities. Hifi has its own comfort equation by getting more from poor recordings. More qualities manifest once we're off racing on premium challenging tracks. To stop talking in borrowed imagery, here's how the thrice-priced COS trumps the iFi. It feels more stately, gravitational and easeful. It's texturally a bit fuller and richer without giving up any separatist resolution whereby images stand clear to not run together or clump. There're a bit more fluidity and bounce. That's essentially it. On its own, each adjective weighs little. Combined, the effect becomes rather noticeable. I'd expect anyone sat in front of either version to hear it. But that's only a small part of the equation. The far more important part is, how does it rate on a person's importance meter? Will it be a whoa, must-have itch? Will the DAC at 1/3rd the coin be plenty good enough? Will that be called silly money already?

I think the dismissive brigade's first big mistake is to conflate their own importance meter with a global standard. Then they do the same with listening ability. If they can't hear it, nobody can. The measurement brigade adds that if it can't be measured, it doesn't exist. So yes, more doesn't always buy more. But it can; and not just features, brand cachet or resell value. Yet it's not a fact that matters in isolation. It's specific to an individual's values. Perception matters. It's not only about how we see the world. It's how we rate and weigh all aspects of it. It's how we define personal satisfaction; and what we're prepared to do about it. My hifi expense is your family's vacation, another man's college or car payment. What gives me pleasure leaves you cold. Ad infinitum. For now I'm grooving to my duded-out desktop. I could easily revert to the prior setup. In a few days I'd forget I ever had this stack. For the time being, it's on hand and might as well strut its stuff because in this instance paid for a long time ago, more did buy more. I just needed to be reminded. Yo, professore!