Question

Connect no longer bit-perfect?


It looks like the Connect is no longer bit-perfect. Here's my evidence: let's discuss this.

First, I constructed a wav file of pink noise with amplitude ramping up from zero to digital max and back to zero.
I play this through my Connect and record the SPDIF output from the coax output into my PC.
The recording uses a Scarlett 8i6 audio interface set to use the Connect as master clock.
I record into a DAW (Sonar) multiple times - all instances are identical.
However, this recorded signal is not quite the same as the original wav file - it can be up to -21dB different.
See https://www.dropbox.com/s/t8od479xo9hi5el/connect_diff.PNG?dl=1
Note the expanded scale on the difference (third) track.

It looks like the difference gets larger when the signal is larger. To confirm this, I import the
original and difference files into Matlab and plot the raw data (difference vs original). There is clearly audio compression
happening here. See https://www.dropbox.com/s/p1yq6wcqafvnhaj/diff_vs_orig.png?dl=1
The scale is such that digital maximum is 1.

There also appears to be a slight bias when the waveform is negative and the signal is below the
compression threshold. See an expanded version of the previous plot
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9001tl9mkle4wly/diff_vs_orig_zoom.png?dl=1

Happy to answer questions about the method and conclusions.

Cheers, Peter.

p.s. Volume is set to fixed - I haven't tried variable.
In a loopback test (8i6 out from DAW to 8i6 in, no Sonos gear involved), I get bit-perfect cancellation.

This topic has been closed for further comments. You can use the search bar to find a similar topic, or create a new one by clicking Create Topic at the top of the page.

453 replies

I would assume that most Connect users don't even use the fixed mode..

I'd have thought that they would, using the av/hi-fi amp to control the volume.

IIs it correct that connect units that were manufactured befor 2011 should still be ok? I'm heavily invested in the sonos ecosystem, and love it very much, so would hate to let Sonos go because of this. But I've started to look into bluesound. So hoping Sonos comes out with a fix. Or I might try to find a connect unit from before 2011.

Yes, I'd be interested in the definitive answer to this too, preferably from Sonos themselves.
Userlevel 5
Badge +9
Well, certainly it was initially a cosmetic change -- or so we thought -- but from recent posts it's clear that from 2011 it was a somewhat different hardware platform.

Indeed - very odd decision to change Bit Perfect "Fixed Volume" into something inferior.

Most of us who bought ZP90 or Connects generally did so to preserve our "High End" systems whilst being able to sync the rest of the house with Play X units.

Better fix it fast Sonos or your going to take a hammering once the Audio Press find out!

Adding functionality to our Sonos systems has always been a great plus point of ownership.

Removing audio quality is not going to win universal acclaim.
Do you start to understand now the double standard being applied here?

No, I really don't think that they do....
On the track volume issue, if you rip to wav format the songs will be louder because there is no volume normalization tag. When itunes rips to a format that allows metadata (I use Apple lossless - ALAC), itunes computes and stores the volume normalization in the track metadata and Sonos then responds to this. Turning off Sound Check in itunes only affects playback within itunes (the tags are always added to formats that allow them.) I wish Sonos had a similar switch! By the way, volume normalization almost always reduces the volume of a track. It couldn't raise the volume because most tracks have peaks close to the maximum, and a volume increase would lead to clipping.

Back to the listening topic. There is no way to use volume to make up for the bass difference I am hearing - I have tried. The attack of the bass cutting through the other instruments has a very specific frequency signature. Increasing the volume alters every frequency. I would like to use the digital input of the Peachtree to free up the only analog input for other purposes. Unfortunately I hear the sound as bent even though I don't want to.

This paragraph may be considered "too much information". My goal has been to record the analog and digital signals so I can demonstrate the difference. Recording the digital output is easy, and it can be lined up perfectly in my audio software with the original wav version. This is where I discovered the 1dB compression. Recording the analog output is also easy, but it requires A2D conversion. I use a fairly high quality audio interface with reputable A2D converters. I also sync the interface SPDIF clock to the Connect. However, there is a problem lining up the waveform with the original - the timing drifts. I didn't expect this, and I don't understand why it happens. It makes it much harder to compare waveforms objectively. I did try to reproduce my original plots and they had a lot of scatter, but I did see some evidence that the analog output also performs compression. When I get some time I will return to these issues.
I also notice that Sonos still hasn't replied to my normalisation question posed elsewhere for a second time.

And is noticeably silent here. Either their engineers don't know what is happening or they are choosing silence.
Userlevel 5
Badge +4
you don't see why someone would want a player that offers say Hires or MQA or bit perfect, then why bother entering the thread of those that do want that to tell them they are wrong and it is not needed?

if I am asking Sonos for an audiophile connect, and you jump in to say it is not needed I have the right to say "Shut the fuck up, just because you don't want it doesn't none of us can have it.".


Language, language...but let me see if I understand what you are saying.

On a forum paid for and administered by a manufacturer that does not seem to be looking in your direction, you want a private sand pit to play in only with like minded buddies that will endorse your views, that others that think different should not enter.

Maybe the title of the thread should clearly indicate this preference in that case? I am not saying that doing this will deliver all that you expect, but it is certainly worth an attempt. It should also prevent you from entering threads that do not indicate such a preference.

Perhaps Sonos can earmark a section of the forum for all such threads, titled " Audiophile Corner, for discussion on unverified subjective and possibly biased claims". Will that serve?



A thread discussing the fact the Sonos Connect, which has been bit perfect for years, and no longer is, is a good thread to bring up that maybe it might be a good idea for Sonos to consider a new product that does what a hell of a lot of people are asking for. And there is a hell of a lot of people out there asking for it. Loads of people who are 'into hifi' have Sonos kit and love it, but wish they offered something to put into their main system too.

Now the fact many who use this forum don't think a higher end, bit perfect source would offer benefit is besides the point, if you are a company, it might be nice to hear what products your customers and potential customers are wanting going forward. Shutting down the discussion with fingers in your ears shouting "It's all a nonsense lah, lah, lah..." is not helping matters. Every time a discussion starts on here about it it is shut down with belittling.

Just look at your post above. More sneering.
Sitting there making snide remarks while a few of your mates pat you on the back for your comedic genius.

The fact is simple, some people would like a bit perfect Sonos player, one that can handle MQA moving forward (which is starting to take off) would be nice too, the big streaming services are running with it, and streaming is all I use these days as I am sure it is for many. Customers are out there who want it, whether you guys want it, or think it is any benefit is irrelevant.

Away from this forum people are starting to move away from Sonos, where audiophile quailty is not that important we are seeing users now buy Chromecasts and cheap but good active speakers, and use streaming from people like Yamaha's Musicast, and where quality is important we are seeing loads go to Bluesound, and Roon where you can use some pretty high end end points or even a £30 Raspberry Pi with the add on sound card and get a better user experience than Sonos (as long as it has the services you want of course, which is why so many still want Sonos). Even the guys selling kit are starting to advise other options, the Sonos thread on the car forum I use which has been running for years, the guy who sells it and started the thread is now recommending other products since the price updates last month.

So belittle all you like, but while you shut down discussion you run the risk of stopping Sonos hear from people with.........God forbid, different opinion and different needs to your own.


So no, you once again haven't got what I am saying at all, all you can see is someone wanting something different to you and therefore feel the need to shut them down, tell them they are stupid, tell them they are wrong. Be careful, that's what happened with Brexit, that is what happened with Trump. The world seems full of people who think their way is the only way, but if you don't stop and listen to the concerns of others and tell them they're wrong all the time it often comes back to bite you. The firs time many had a chance to speak without being vilified was in the polling booth, and look what happened!!!

Have you considered Sonos may like to hear how much demand there is for such a product? If you let the threads run they just might get to hear. The way it is at the moment they probably think there is no demand, the problem is many who want those products won't use these forums as the perceived negativity towards them on here stops them posting.
As you say, they pay for this forum, maybe they would like to hear 'everyones' view, not just a handful of posters who live on here??


All the above is just my opinion of course and I am sure you will dissect every word I have just written to try and pull it apart and make me look stupid, and that is fine, I get that is how you feel good about yourself, but I have tried to reply in the most polite way I can and not bite at your condescending remarks above, explaining my thoughts as well as I can, what you do with that info is up to you, but it would be nice if you just stopped and thought "OK, I don't get why you'd want that, but if you do then fair enough."

I live in hope. 😃
But the JBL 305/308s, for example, are superior. When I say that, it is not only based on my own listening. After all, your listening experiences may be different from mine. When I say that, it is based on objective parameters that have been shown to correlate with listener satisfaction in psychoacoustic studies: Frequency response, dispersion pattern, polar response, response in the time domain, the ability to play loud without distortion, etc. On all of these parameters, the JBL 305s/308s perform better than a pair of Sonos play:1 with sub.

Digressing from the thread, but this is a very interesting point.
I would argue that not all measured differences will result in audible differences, and of those that do, not all will be preferred.
For something like a speaker, all that matters is which one I prefer to listen to. Not what you do, or not what has been "shown" to correlate with listener satisfaction in studies, although I grant that the odds in that case are skewed to that speaker ending up to be preferred more often than not. And some things that aren't measured, like looks, will also influence the preference.
Which is why it is never a good idea to buy a speaker only based on its reported measurements. For instance, I may prefer the way the 1 pair + hidden Sub looks, compared to the industrial looks of the JBL, and that may drive my preference for the Sonos set up. Or not.
So for speakers, the only use of measurements is to make a short list; ideally before buying, they should be heard at home, sighted, with preferred music, from the usual source, and the ones that then sound best for the budget should be the ones to buy.
And although this is a digression, it does underline the irrelevance of the bit perfect thing, except to meet psychological needs. That said, I get that those that are influenced by these needs will not be happy with the Connect as it is stated to be these days.
By the way - when you say the 305/308 perform better than the 1 pair + Sub, you also need to say whether this is the case with today's Connect, or the one before the change was made, and also based on what kind of inputs are given to the JBL pair...:) Which makes things complicated and just an example of why a listening test at home of the kind I described trumps all measurements for electro mechanical devices like speakers.
Does Sonos care about this state of affairs for the Connect? For them to say, so let's see if any response is forthcoming.
....also because the change would have been made for valid reasons that may then have to be addressed in a different way.

You have no idea why the change was made - this is pure speculation.

The thing that I find most ironic is that for years the fanboys have been yelling 'bit-perfect, bit perfect' (because it says so in a very old test of a ZP80) and shouting down people who claim that other dacs and conversions sound better. We now find out that, since 2011, people who care about sound quality could have been right all along...


Of course I do not know why the change was made, but I'd say it is more reasonable to assume that Sonos made the change for valid reasons, than to say that they did not have a valid reason to do so...or are you challenging this statement as well?:-)

And those that were saying "bit perfect" were doing so - AFAIK - to explain that the Connect was equivalent to any digital transport out there, and was therefore just as capable as any CD player for example, to supply bits to any external DAC for conversion. That - as I am convinced - the Connect DAC is audibly just as good as any other DAC was not being claimed by those saying "bit perfect".
I also take your last statement to imply that "people who care about sound quality could have been right all along", could also have been wrong; and if so, I agree with that statement:)

I agree with LeighB that if the digital output isn't bit perfect anymore, why have it there at all - except perhaps that it would mean a cost to even change the hardware to remove it such that may not be worth the corresponding saving.

Thunderous silence continues from Sonos on this thread...
As for Bluesound, I think it's important to note that Sonos started out in this way too: a predecessor to these forums was full of people interacting with Sonos staff, making suggestions. providing feedback, and getting direct responses from Sonos Product Engineering. Many of these discussions resulted in changes to the product and new features being added.

Once a company gets to a certain size, this sort of interaction is unmaintainable. Sonos has gone from a small start-up with a few thousand customers to one of the top-3 speaker vendors in the world, and probably the leader in whole-house streaming systems. Their customer base is now reported to be in the millions across the world. It's simply not possible for them to respond positively to every customer on every issue. For every customer who wants high-end enhancements, there are 100 who want Sonos to make a low-quality Bluetooth speaker, or wireless headphones, or a portable garden speaker, or the SUB in pink...

That Bluesound are able to engage in this sort of interaction points to them still being a small company with relatively few customers, just as Sonos were back in 2005. It points to them still being in the development phase of the product and the company. It points to them having a brand new platform without yet having to deal with legacy support/compatibility issues.

If they ever grow their market share to be any sort of real commercial threat to Sonos, then they will have to abandon this sort of consumer interaction.

The chances are they won't get that big and, in which case they can be a viable alternative to Sonos, catering to a niche of customers who want something over and above what Sonos does. Although that puts them and their customers in a very precarious position.

One way or another, in a few years time you are going to be unlikely to have the same sort of interaction with Bluesound staff as you are currently seeing.

Cheers,

Keith
Badge +1
OK, back to the topic of "Connect no longer bit-perfect?"

SONOS changed the processing in the Connect firmware in versions 6 and later which resulted in the S/PDIF output for fix-volume setting to no longer be bit-perfect to the input stream. For what reason, or functional intent, has yet to be made public. I can speculate a number of reasons why this happened, but there is no need to speculate -- it happened and it's remained in place over several firmware revisions indicating to me that it was intentional and is here for the long term.

I started to wonder, why would this be an issue? Then I wondered if SONOS had ever made a claim in the past that the Connect was bit-perfect, or was this simply an observation that some reviewer made in the past and it became an Internet fact.

When the Connect digital output was bit-perfect to the stream, I considered it a valued component as a streamer to a better quality DAC in an audiophile setup, providing the equivalent of a wire between the streaming source and my DAC. For me, the Connect was simply an S/PDIF output interface to what I think is one of the best controller interfaces for streaming and queue management. Now that I know that it's no longer bit-perfect, I no longer consider the Connect a trusted "equivalent of a wire" component in my setup. I've tried to move on to other streaming products like the Bluesound Node2, but it's controller interface comes no where close to the functionality and performance of the SONOS Controller.

The SONOS organizational and product focus changes that manifested about a year ago gives me the impression that SONOS is going into a different direction and would rather not worry about this. I continue to hope that there will be a reversal on decision at SONOS to re-instate the legacy capability, even if it's via an advanced setting to enable it for the few of us that care.

The more of the posts I reviewed and the more I thought about this, I couldn't help but ask the question "Why does it need to be bit-perfect?". Well, I can think of the following reason -- to use the product for the controller and streaming service interface capabilities so that it functions in a transparent manner when doing so.

I bumped into this topic from the post and thread about the Connect and playback of MQA encoded tracks as I was curious to see what the community had to report on the apparent ability to select an MQA track on TIDAL and have it play on SONOS equipment. Knowing that the Connect was no longer bit-perfect I felt that there would be no opportunity to pass through MQA encoded tracks to an MQA capable DAC.

And incidentally, I feel there is another reason for support bit-perfect and 24-bit. I'd prefer to process all of my local 16/44.1 content that has been mastered with peaks to 0dBFS to reduce the amplitude with a 1 bit shift with a conversion from 16-bit to 24-bit and playback the 24-bit version with no loss of fidelity and no peak level distortions. Storage is cheap and I don't care that that the resultant conversion is 30% 0's in its raw form -- I am interested in the fidelity and listening quality. Technically, this would be possible with the digital volume control on the Connect, but there is no evidence that this can be performed transparently either. As for the SONOS speaker systems,I never considered them audiophile grade and they are used for convenience over sound quality.
Userlevel 7
Badge +26
Hi Peter, it's still being looked into. There's a lot of different projects and work that's always going on at Sonos, and a software update usually has been in the works for months before it gets released. There are months worth of testing well after all the features for an update are finished, and unless a big issue is found, that update is pretty much out the door. But even then, the next couple updates are usually being worked on too, in various stages of development.

We don't usually talk much about what's coming up in the future, timelines change and all sorts of things can come up. But this topic hasn't been forgotten or shelved. The CONNECT's output and handling of volume normalization is being looked into by the right teams. I can't share anything specific or a timeline, but I'll let you know if anything new comes up we can say.
Userlevel 5
Badge +4
Sorry, I totally disagree with you.

Sonos is a system that works with other kit, it is designed to work with other marques and does that well, so being able to discuss what it works with well and where the kit could be improved to keep existing customers and bring in new customers is what forums like this should be about.

One of the main reasons I mentioned moving away from the connects to the Raspberry Pi units is because they allow me to do what I do now with Sonos but also allow me to send files via Airplay too, which is one thing I really wish Sonos would add at some point in the future.

The Meridian forum I am on are always suggesting other peoples kit to people if it will do what they want better, I found most of the info on Bel Canto last week from the Cyrus forum and I bought my E Class estate after loads of guys on the BMW forum I used suggested it would be the best for my needs.

Complete refusal to acknowledge other peoples way of thinking and shooting down their discussions is not good for the forum or for Sonos.


I'm not passive aggressive pimping other products at all, I'm just not saying 'there is only Sonos'.

It feels a bit like being on a Playstation or Xbox forum on here!
We get you are well and truly "Sonos" but maybe not everyone is quite so blinkered in how you have to use Sonos to enjoy it, it isn't an all or nothing, you can have Sonos and other kit too you know? 😃
Userlevel 5
Badge +4
Blimey thanks for the education. Christ, tomorrow they will probably tell me the earth isn't flat, that will really ruin my week.

Yeah, of course it is in the mastering, but when the best masters are only available through hi res or MQA it would be nice to be able to play them.

I agree with what you said, but I think there is lots to be done with timing and reducing digital smearing, and that is usually done at higher rates.

If all dacs were perfect, if all masterings were perfect your arguments would hold true, but they are not. Still a long way to go.


Have you tried MQA?
A simple MQA dac and a pair of headphones, switch the MQA on and off. Some tracks have serious gains, others not so.
But there is a difference.


However, no matter what I say you obviously have your beliefs and don't want to change them.
Userlevel 5
Badge +4
What's wrong with that is you can do the exact same thing with a DSP and/or equalizer, in an almost infinite amount of configurations, and not pay thousands of dollars for it. A DAC shouldn't be purposefully coloring the output, if it does, it is not a "pure" DAC, it's nothing but DSP snake oil easily achieved in much less deceptive (and less expensive) ways.

You can tailor the sound to make it sound similar using DSP, but that will be hiding more detail. Not saying that is a bad thing.
And there has been advances in digital playback that has improved things considerably, to believe that we can progress no more is just naive.
I agree a DAC shouldn't colour the output, but they are not perfect yet, so they do, the better DACs simply colour them less.


Who has said anything about paying thousands of dollars?
I am talking about DACs like the Meridian Explorer 2, retails at £129 (so around $149) or the Audioquest Dragonfly at £89, so around $119, both will do MQA.

I use Roon a my interface, Sonos as the endpoint is nice because it allows me to also play the compressed services Roon does not support like Spotify and Apple Music, so it is handy. What is wrong with wanting to be able to play the MQA files?

Why do the same people feel the need to come into every thread where people are asking for new features or for devices to be bit perfect and say "You're wrong, you're an idiot, all hifi and all files sound the same."

Do you go onto Porsche forums and say "You're all stupid, a Toyota will get you from A-B" or the watch forums and say "A Casio from the filling station free with a tank of gas will tell the time the same as a Rolex".
Of course they will, but some people may want more than that.
Userlevel 5
Badge +4


Why do the same people feel the need to come into every thread where people are asking for new features or for devices to be bit perfect and say "You're wrong, you're an idiot, all hifi and all files sound the same."

Do you go onto Porsche forums and say "You're all stupid, a Toyota will get you from A-B" or the watch forums and say "A Casio from the filling station free with a tank of gas will tell the time the same as a Rolex".
Of course they will, but some people may want more than that.


A Porsche can be objectively tested against a Toyota using scientifically valid methods and found to be a better performer. Also, if a Toyota was measured 0-60 to be faster than a Porsche (it has happened) in an objective series of tests, would you actually claim the Porsche is faster 0-60? Bottom line, give me a scientifically valid objective test of differences in quality of audio equipment and I'll back your post against any and all comers.

I'll be waiting.

As to the Rolex vs. Casio analogy, if you want to purchase audio equipment according to subjective styling or expensive decorative jewels or other materials, be my guest. I do the same with lots of purchases. However, if you claim it performs better, you better have experimental data to back up that claim.


I give up.

You really are missing the point.

Some people want to discuss these things, let them discuss it rather than come into the thread and derail it.

The analogy with the car was not comparing dac differences FFS! It was pointing out on every forum, no matter what the subject content is, you get silly know it all old men like yourself who ruin every thread like you guys have this one. What pleasure do you get from that?
If you don't agree with our point of view fair enough, but just keep out and let people discuss things.


How does this apply to those who have other possibly controversial opinions about audio matters? For example, that MQA sounds better to them, or an external DAC sounds better to them than the internal DAC on a Connect, or that 24 bit sounds better to them?

Do we not need a consistent standard here?


As stated, opinions are fine. It's once someone starts making definitive claims that they need to start giving proof. But that's not really an apt description of what happens. What really happens is this:

Hi-res sounds better to me, it's night and day!

Well, that could be due to remastering, because biology, physics and math states it isn't possible for the Hi-res to sound better. Have you done an ABX with a downsampled version from the same master? Any time this has been tested in the past, the results pointed to the differences being in the mastering, so if you really can tell the difference, that would be a very big thing.

I don't have to, I know what I hear! Hi-res is better! Who are you to question my ears? Are you telling me my $$$ system is no better than your crap? Are you a trained listener? I have golden ears! People once thought the world was flat! Go away, you old know it all!

Compare this with Kumar, who fully admits that bias, $$$, expectations, shiny dials, and even a dram of tipple can can color one's opinion vs reality. Put another way, Kumar's claims are not extraordinary, it is perfectly possible for one to subjectively like the sound from Sonos over an audiophile system. Even so, Kumar makes no claim that his views are universal, he expressly states they are subjective.

Most Hi-res fans, on the other hand, make extraordinary claims which violate known laws of math, physics, and biology, yet they refuse to accept there may be other factors at work. No bias, no placebo effect, no mastering differences, it's all in the higher resolution.

See the difference?

PS - I deliberately used Hi-res and not MQA in my examples. I fully believe anyone who states MQA sounds superior. I'm also aware that given the MQA specs, it's more than likely this is due to remastering by Meridian than anything in the codec. However, since Meridian conveniently doesn't allow stripping out the raw data for downsampling to CD quality, it is unfair of me to request an ABX test. Meridian is the high-end of snake oil. Kudos to them.
Userlevel 5
Badge +4
Not sure what models were specifically affected. Sonos would have to answer that.

As to your trying to get this thread back on topic; I have been chuckling for the past couple of days at the outrage directed at me for "derailing" this thread. Outrage which came from a poster who ignored everything about the Connect being bit-perfect and instead shot us off the rails into Hires/MQA land!


I said I didn't understand why the same few people come into every thread where people are discussing getting more from their system and call those people fools.

I said that we could do with Sonos offering an "audiophile" product (Note audiophile for their marketing reasons) that offered Bit Perfect output and with MQA now coming to Tidal and talk of Spotify getting on board it would be a nice option that I am sure they would do incredibly well with.


The only reason I came back on was because I searched for "Sonos Connect Modification" on google to look for something, and what was the first hit?

You, 4 years ago calling any Sonos Connect mods snake oil. :D

https://en.community.sonos.com/advanced-setups-229000/zp90connect-modification-comparison-27830/index1.html#post177195

At least you're consistent.

The whole gang is there too, Kumar et al.



I agree with much of what you say, but there is also loads I don't agree on, but hey ho, such is life, it would be boring if we all thought the same.
Userlevel 5
Badge +4


I didn't say you shouldn't.


You have an incredibly aggressive nature, every post of yours makes you seem like a very angry chap.


Attacking the messenger is the last bastion of defence for a failure.


Jesus wept! 😃
Userlevel 5
Badge +4
No. I read through it last night and it is just 'same old, same old'.

I don't enjoy arguing with people, and all you lot want to do is argue. It doesn't matter what I say, I will get jagitate tell me that I'm wrong or I'm a fool so don't see the point.


Wow, I didn't think we'd be seeing the victim card so early from you. I honestly had higher hopes.

And the childish respelling of my username? Nice touch. I'm sure you can find a large following on gaming console sites. :D



If you weren't such an opinionated bigot I would bother, but what's the point?

I know for a fact I'm not the only one who thinks this because of the PMs I have had from other members telling me they have just learnt to ignore you or don't post in the threads you post in, although pretty hard with such a post count as you do seem to be in almost every thread.

Find a large following? Is that what you think people want? Is that why you have nearly 13000 posts on here? To get a following.
Oh dear.
It seems people who claim hi-res sounds better cop a beating on this forum for not providing suitable evidence of what is taken to be a statement of fact, whereas a claim that someone is a liar is to be inferred as opinion and therefore need not be backed up with evidence. How do your "people that know better" tell the difference between these two scenarios?
Sorry, I still don't get you. In my view, both statements obviously are opinions, I don't need the "in my opinion" caveat to be attached to each to infer them to be so. And if challenged, both need to be backed up. I see that jgatie is doing just that with respect to the second, so I will not add anything there except to say that he is making a fine point of distinction that needs to be discerned.
Just for the heck of it, let me give what would my response have been if asked!

I'd have said that the author of a study that found and reported some perceived differences at times between Hi Res and CD based on a meta analysis of reports, some of admittedly dubious quality that his study relied upon, allowed himself to be directly quoted as saying things in favour of Hi res found by his study, that his own study did not admit to have found. And this was cleverly done, with the admittedly wrong quote only accepted to be so where and when challenged.

How's that, Ump?!
Mostly we try and approve the final copy, but this is not always possible. There is no evidence that the inaccuracy was found and allowed through. When you say "cleverly done", this implies a deliberate act, and there is no evidence of this. Also, the wrong quote can only be admitted when it is observed. Finally, the primary source is the paper. No such statement appears in the paper. So I would say, on appeal, Not Out!
Oh come now Peter, aren't you stretching things a tad?
The author of the report said this himself on the other thread on this site:
"Press releases are put forward by organisations with the aim of trying to get the press to cover their story, and as such are a combination of spin, marketing, opinion and fact. In this case, it was written by a press officer at my university, and then AES issued another similar one." I have cut/pasted, no spin!

This isn't just a random release on the net that the author can be excused for being ignorant about, but is from the author's organisation! You really think that the author, if he did not make these fully fleshed out and attributed in quotes to him statements, also remained ignorant of what his own organisation is saying what he said, and that too in italicised quotes? In this day and age? And then also continued to remain ignorant of the AES doing the same thing? Knowing as he says he does that press releases are used for spin? Is it then that his organisation is the one doing the clever shill and our author is just the naive scientist labouring honestly in the lab, not knowing what his evil superiors are doing to spin his report?! Give me a break!

I am not saying this isn't possible, just making my assessment of the probabilities. And why can I not say that if he really did not know how his organisation is spinning his report, that is in itself an indictment of sorts?
...a combination of spin, marketing, opinion and fact

None of those imply stating something that is incorrect. My organization also puts out press releases with the same four qualities. This is done by science journalists after talking to the authors of the work. The copy is not always checked by the authors before release due to press deadlines. But I strongly believe that where at all possible a press release should always be checked by the author of the work, and this is one lesson to be learned here. Even after checking, I know of cases where the sub-editor of a newspaper chose headlines or picture captions that were just plain wrong. This occurred after any chance of checking.

On the flip side, there is also an obligation on the part of a reader of internet information to check the primary source before getting too carried away by what they have read. In this case it is the published paper itself. The press release contained a link to the paper, which is freely available. Anyone who is mislead by the press release has not done their due diligence and checked the primary source.

So, to summarize, both sides of the argument need to get their checking act together 🙂
Userlevel 7
Badge +21
My question is... how did Sonos allow the Connect to NOT become bit-perfect with the Fixed Volume setting?! Surely someone, somewhere would have realized that a change being made would affect the audio output, and that the Connect - the one Sonos device that has been reported as having bit-perfect digital output - would no longer be able to make that claim. If they decide that they want to still allow the level adjustment for the fixed volume setting, there should at least be the option to disable it, returning bit-perfect output for those that want it.

On the other hand, many have wanted some kind of volume leveling in the speakers... and while Sonos has never said anything about it, it appears that they've been working on it.
Userlevel 5
Badge +4
Bigot can mean the same in the UK too, but we are talking about hifi, not races or cultures.
I presumed that people were intelligent enough to understand the context of the discussion we were having.

"a person who is obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially : one who regards or treats the members of a group (as in those who believe in Hi Res) with hatred and intolerance" 😃

Maybe I should have said 'insular' instead, or 'snob' but then most people don't understand the word 'snob' many think it means stuck up or posh.

I think the problem maybe that Bigot has been used so much in the last few months with what has been happening with Brexit and Trump that many maybe only know it from hearing it in a derogatory way.
It is the same when you call someone ignorant, so many people get all annoyed and say things like "Don't call me stupid!". Which is always kind of ironic.