Madness…no this is Schiit! Kicks guy into well!
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You need a couple Fulla Schiits in there for good measure.
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Now THAT is funny!
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So, to be clear, the 3-days of listening time refers specifically to three dedicated days of focused critical/audition-style listening. Which includes adhering to my standard albums and playlists, my check-list, listening notes and nothing else at all going on.
I don’t do it if I’m not well rested, feeling off, not in the mood or there are other factors (e.g. someone pile-driving enourmous pilings for a new pier just across the street).
Invariably that comes after I’ve already been listening to the item in question for 3-4 days before that in non-critical situations and with whatever I’m in the mood to listen to.
And there is pretty much a slew of items in various states of burn-in hanging around in the queue as I have plenty of sources/amps/headphones to facilitate such things.
For me, just discerning like/dislike is pretty quick.
Understanding why can take a good bit longer - especially if it’s something subtle (like listening fatigue issues with DACs).
But the detailed review notes come from systemic, disciplined, listening sessions, which take as long as they take - again typically about 24 hours of listening over a 3 day (or so - 3 days seems to be the minimum).
And then specific unit-to-unit comparisons generally go on top of that.
Pretty much!
A lot depends on how much existing familiarity I have with something (e.g. an Yggdrasil or DFR review would skip immediately to the critical/audition listening part, since I’ve owned them for ages and am more than passingly familiar with them).
Travel, other activities (like “Come from Away” at 5th Ave last night), or just not being in the mood (etc.) often result in that nominal review-a-week goal NOT being met.
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Wow, I really had no idea that you needed to be as involved when writing one of your reviews. That’s a lot of listening and note taking.
It’s the New Years honours list for you my son.
. Arise Sir Torq. (just a bit of fun).
Listening fatigue must take its toll. And what happens when you get a head cold? Or am I being a bit extreme.
-Paul-
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Happy Birthday Ryan.
-Paul-
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I have a pretty good understanding of how this works for me now…with the most recent DAC/amps I am reviewing/giving thoughts on. Instantly liked the NiBL, instantly disliked the Dragonfly Black.
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I will jump on the Haps to the B-day train my man! hope it is an enjoyable one, nice it falls on a weekend…mine this month is mid week…for shame! 
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Drinks will definitely be had!
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I probably don’t need to do things to quite that level.
It was a process I started when comparing high-end DACs when I was looking for a new one. DAC differences are smaller than those that exist between amplifiers, and much smaller than between headphones, and it just grew out of that and wound up becoming “how I do things”.
There are blind-evaluation/comparison stages in there as well.
It makes for a fair amount of work. I don’t think it’s necessary for everyone to approach it that way - it just works for me. In general, I would say use whatever methodology you would use when evaluating gear for your own purchases - and then just be consistent to that with subsequent gear/reviews.
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Firstly, please don’t think that I was in anyway ridiculing you. I would hate it if that’s how I came across. What I was trying to express (although not very well) was the incredible amount of effort it must take to have to put out the amount of content that you do. The work you do is very professional and it just interests me how you go about it. I have read some articles, I think one may have been from Tyll himself, about critical listening and how incredibly fatiguing it can be. He/they went on to say it can be a skill that you can learn and become better at the more time that you put in. A lot of it is probably down to concentration levels as well.
I find it difficult enough to concentrate on critical listening with just my headphones and music being the focus. As you say when taking into account Amp and Dac’s it becomes much, much harder. I certainly don’t go to the lengths that you do although for me critical listening and developing my listening skills is all part of the fun.
-Paul-
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No worries, I didn’t think that at all!
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My eyes have gone green with envy again. 
. Seriously though, hope you have a great time with it and let us know what you think. I have never owned any Schiit products so it will be nice to hear what you think.
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My pyramid of darkness! So far I’m digging on it…but only had a couple minutes so far of listening. Balanced is super sensitive to source(if it is poorly mastered it really shows, lots of background noise or constant ants eating snow muffled in the background), but if you have solid source material balanced sounds great, single ended works really well with no issues so far with source. Powerful amp that is for sure. It has a very sterile sound profile as of right now. Need more time with it to let my brain and whatever else burn in.
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@Torq your setting recommendations for the RME-ADI2DAC and the Jotunheim worked like a charm, the grain and background noise are gone, and I have more wiggle room with the volume. Much appreciated!
For those wondering what the recommendation was:
"… you’ll very likely get a much better result if you lower the Output Reference Level on the RME ADI-2 DAC … especially if you’re using a balanced connection.
I would try +1 dBU first (which will be a manual setting) and that’ll let you keep the volume setting at 0 dBR. (It’ll show 0 dB rather than 0 dBR if you’re in manual reference level mode)." ~ @Torq
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That is a thing of beauty my son.
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Awesome @TylersEclectic, I just ordered a silver Jotenheim (multibit) today…Wanted something with a little more juice. I thought about getting black, but I listen at night, and figured the headphone jacks would be easier to find on the silver one.
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