Hi,
Are the filters in the Vivaldi upsampler and DAC effective immediately after change?
When I toggle the filters on the front panel or set them on the iPad, I cannot hear any difference. I see the filters change in the display thought.
My setup is pretty good.
Not sure if I need to worry about my ears?
Many people say that they cannot hear the different filters. Do not expect immediate and significant audible changes. The effect is quite subtle on first encounter. It is more likely that you may choose a filter setting, not hear much change, then a long time later start to think “I’m not really enjoying this” - more of a feeling than hearing.
Choosing your favourite filters can take a lot of time and experience. To start (and maybe to keep) I would simply use the setting for each data resolution that is recommended in the user manuals. Incidentally they broadly coincide with my personal choices made over many years.
My wife is a professional musician with perfect pitch hearing, so I assume she’s also sensitive to subtle changes. She did pick up on the fact that Rossini sounded different from Bartok, most filters sounded alike to her on the same unit, and lost patience rather quickly to serve as reference equipment to me. Says to just focus on the damn emotion that music conveys; to her playback quality doesn’t matter one bit. Oftentimes she just listens—in the same room where the music system is set up—via a mono Sonos speaker solely because to her it’s simpler to use. Says she’s enjoying the music just as much and I’m focusing on the wrong end of things.
I hear you. She’s got lots of her material recorded on lowly TDK D-60 tapes, and she’s not complaining one bit about the quality. On the other hand she’s done recordings in famed studios such as Criteria Studios in Miami for commercial releases and to her it’s all the same. Goes to the message conveyed by the music, not the fidelity thereof.
To me on the other hand, quality matters and I’ve found bliss with Rossini.
I can hear differences between some power cords. I can’t hear any difference with the filters. The filters are like the different shades of white paint. Power cords are different shades of green…
Whether one can hear the effects of the various filters also depends on what source disc/file/stream exactly you’re listening to. Not much point expecting to hear a day & night difference with majority of the compressed music out there
I can easily hear differences between dxd and dsd upsampling. Some filters are also quite obviously different-sounding, while others are less so. As the previous post indicates, different sources will impart a different degree of detectability when changing filters. Additionally, I found to prefer certain combinations (map/upsampling/filter) for certain songs and playback methods (speakers vs headphones)
Bottom line, it takes time and patience to arrive at one’s preference, and those may change over time, mood, or with different material. I deem this a fantastic opportunity—not unlike tube rolling—to experiment with different renditions of recordings, all from the convenience of the Mosaic app. One day I may prefer a crisp, “be there” sound, some other just a laid back DSDx2/M1/F5 sound.
Found myself fiddling with the filters yesterday and came back to this thread after a search. Adding the Vivaldi dac and upsampler setting information here for reference.