Jim G wrote:
Not at all what I'm saying, Pete. Definitely not condemning anybody's stereo. Systems are different and capable of different things. Like the day you and I listened to our dacs at Charlie's. Until that moment I never realized how poorly my dac soundstages in 3 dimensions compared to his (or yours). But Charlie's dac in my system didn't soundstage any better than mine because my 2 way horn system can't soundstage like his. The dacs were very similar in my system. Charlie's system also has shortcomings too, like everyone else's.
I think the caveat should be, "in my system, I can't/can hear a difference between "x" and "y" with the understanding it may be different elsewhere.
Proving a null hypothesis (there is no difference) is extremely difficult. Confirming a difference in a properly designed listening session is not so difficult.