They are and have, and continue to do so.
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Without a doubtâŚWindom in my system surpasses any prior OS update. I still at times cannot believe how much more across the board musical bliss I am hearing with Windom [BIG-TIME!] than what Snowmass delivered ⌠Instruments/voices now have that elusive quality of sound [that I have not âeverâ heard âanywhereâ before] that draw me into a recordingâŚas if Iâm hearing the desired intention of the musicians craft for the very first timeâŚevery note just comes alive in a way that seems correct and real as opposed to wrong and fake.
I cant help to believe that the bottom line is⌠for some weird reasonâŚWindom updates either take hold and work as intended or they do not. Whatever the reasonâŚit is something PSA really needs to look intoâŚ
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Thatâs great it is a good fit for you, Mark. It is not a black and white thing. The exact same load in different systems may have more or less synergy, or may appeal to the owner more or less, much as any component - or any DS FW iteration. It is like saying, âIf everyone just bought such-and-such a component, they would all hear what I amâ.
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Yes MarkâŚthat is why I said in âmy systemâ. The one glove fits all⌠is of courseâŚa mythâŚexcept for maybe OJâŚ
Well I guess the So called bad Snowmass load was from PS as My dac came with the latest Snowmass as it was brand new Direct from PS and Windom Blows it away. Using SRV Tin Pan Ally is a horrid track as its so over the top. Judging bass on that is so room speaker dependent . Use a Real stand up bass from a good live recording. "Use me " Patricia Barber Companion and then listen . Windom is not for everyone as they are not used to getting a true HOLOGRAPHIC stage and want that pin point detail with separate placement of instruments and musicians. Windom recreates the recording venue and its reverb and nuances more real. Tonight I will be listening the the NEW $350K Wilson Chronosonic XVX and I will be sure to compare the $1,000,000 set up being used and get a coparitive to my own Wilsons and Custom Built set up !
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Thatâs where it gets even more interesting - I would bet money that most would prefer Windom in MY system over Snowmass. I imagine it going something like this. On switching to Windom, the reaction would be:
âDonât you hear thatâŚMoreâŚEverything?!?â (eyebrows raised, arms spread wide).
And I would say, âYes, I doâ.
âHow can you not prefer this?â
âI donât know, butâŚâ (shrugs, spreads hands).
When I first had DSJ two years ago (running Huron), I always wanted to hear a bit more, as if there was a veil between the music and me; Given long break-in and later upgrade to RedCloud it was better but I still miss that memory of intimacy that I grew up with LPs; I found the answer after I added the vinyl playback system; To match with Vinyl playback system I upgraded to DS with Snowmass earlier this year. After break-in it was clearly a step up from DSJ. Now with Windom the DMP + DS renders music so well, it make me want to finally pull out the reserved Kisecki purple heart to up the game on Vinyl system; I have had Hana SL on VPL Classic 4 since I got them but I feel that Windom starts to match and outshine what Hana SL can bring to table. Kudos to Ted and PS Audio team!
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This is a really interesting topic.
And Iâm with you. And we all just have more or less unperfect components.
On the one hand I think a component or firmware that is just more revealing (or improved in technical parameters which have a purely positive impact) than its predecessor is better, period. If it doesnât sound better, something in the environment must be wrong.
On the other hand I say, as long as a component or firmware is not perfect in all criterias and technical aspects, a technical improvement in a clear positive direction does not have to provide better overall sound, as the otherwise unperfect and not yet fixed characteristics of this gear or firmware could cause unwelcome effects of an otherwise purely positive update.
As modification of my recent analogy:
Imagine you put a 300PS Porsche motor into a Toyota Yaris. The motor is clearly better than the original one, but it will lead to pushing the Toyta with its slim tires out of every second turn unless driven extremely careful.
Means in audio: not only unless everything in the setup fits to the demands of a certain improvement, it may have also negative impactâŚbut also ⌠unless really everything within this improved component or firmware is perfect, singular improvements may have negative side effects.
Just my logic.
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The issue Iâd still take with this notion is one that both Elk and I have brought up more than once.
I think most people would perceive a (letâs say, for the sake of argument, âperfectâ, lossless, very slight and subtle) boost in certain frequencies as âmore revealingâ. You would âhear intoâ the music âfurtherâ, hear details youâve never noticed before, etc. Oftentimes this is the essence of what is happening with a more ârevealingâ speaker, cable, component. The FR of the system or component is different from what you are used to. How and where the speaker is crossed over, the materials used for the drivers or the wires, etc.
Now, it is possible that you are starting with a system/component/wire that is less than flat in its response in that frequency range. However, you canât just keep going down that road, continually making it âbetterâ.
I fully agree. Some perceive e.g. a risen top end as more revealing. And this âmore of a certain frequency etc.â is not what I understand by ârevealingâ.
To me revealing mainly means providing more information in terms of space, air, ambiance, openness, transparency while tonality remains equal. This is what I hear from Windom. I donât hear any increase of high frequency or similar (but I donât doubt that some may hear this in their setup).
Perhaps related (warning many mixed metaphors ahead):
When optimizing some metric thereâs always the hill climbing problem, if you only take âgoodâ steps you probably wonât get to the true optimum (the top of the tallest mountain), youâll get to the top of some other smaller hill. You have to, at times, take a âbadâ step to not get trapped on a smaller hill.
When trying a new component (or cable, etc.) if you always take the one that seems the more revealing, you will (very probably) keep yourself from finding the best sounding system (however you define it.)
When you reach a plateau you may need to look around, find the weakest part of your system, fix it (or at least make it better) and then start optimizing again.
Most of us know that always taking the most revealing path often leads to a system we stop listening to. Being careful to not choose anything that lessens your enjoyment over a week or so can help. But periodically we need to really shake things up to continue the journey.
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Very wise and true.
IMO the degree of âperfection in an absolute senseâ (whatever this means) a setup getâs determines the degree you can go down the ârevealingâ road without damage.
Another random thought:
If someone has (consciously or unconsciously) been patching some problems in, say, Snowmass and, for argumentâs sake, Windom fixes that same problem, those patches may need to be removed to get to a balanced sound.
Sometimes this is kind of obvious, if, say, Snowmass was a little rolled off in the highs (not that I think is was) and you âfixedâ that, when going to Windom the highs would be worse until you removed your âfix.â
Sometimes itâs more subtle: if your soundstage was a little narrow and you artificially widened it with, say, some diffusion, when, say, Windom comes along with a âbetterâ soundstage, you may then have mush or even a narrower sound stage.
Soundstage is complicated: just as one example, one thing you can do artificially to narrow the sound stage is to add some correlated noise to both channels, or adding uncorrelated noise to both channels may widen the soundstage. But adding noise will almost certainly make the soundstage more diffuse (things wonât be so well positioned in space or the space between them will be less well defined.)
The best thing to get the soundstage thatâs most like what the masterer/recording engineer heard is to have the cleanest, most accurate reproduction of the DACâs input. Those details are what gives a more convincing soundstage. You canât get realism with gimmicks like extra diffusion, or rear firing tweeters, etc. if they cause muddying of these low level details.
One trick to lessen these possible negative interferences is to make sure that any reflections from walls, ceilings, etc. are at least about 11â longer than the direct path. Then the ear will hear them as some form of echo rather than a coloration of the sound.
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Ted, thatâs what most folks call âHeadphonesâ 
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I remind of one comment to one of Paulâs youtube videos: âPaul, when I follow the rule of thirds, Iâm sitting in my closetâ 
So optimizing reflection zones might require quite some structural alteration measures for the one or other.
Great point. If we were comparing âregularâ DACs with Burr-Brown, Cirrus Logic, or whatever chipset, no one would be surprised if there were differing opinions on how they sounded.
FWIW, after living through all of the DSD firmware upgrades and other component changes, Iâve discovered that how realistically the sound of human voices and individual instruments are reproduced - at both the front of, and at low levels at the rear of the soundstage - unconsciously drove my decision-making, with things such as pinpoint imaging and soundstage shape being lesser factors.
One could argue and make a valid point regarding what constitutes ârealismâ in recorded sound, but I came to appreciate music at a younger age and played several instruments (although not all that well 
) in high school bands and a regional youth orchestra. Hearing the range of wind and string instruments âup close and personalâ seems to have created an indelible reference.
I suspect our individual references/preferences have a basis somewhere within the context of our first positive exposure to music
25 posts were merged into an existing topic: Windom: Installation/Technical Problems
Red River â Iâm running a VPI Classic IV with a Kiseki Purple Heart. It does sound great. Windom v LP is often a very close call, except perhaps on recordings originally made on tape, digitized by who knows, and rendered on Quobuz in Redbook (compared to a good first pressing LP). Perfect LPs from the pre-CD days usually beat Quobuzâs version via Windom. Newer stuff? Windom wins every time.
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Indeed, depends upon the recording quality, mastering, and production quality (pressing); I have collected some CDs that sounded a lot like D2D vinyl, and also some vinyl produced in recent years with exceptional quality that still betters the CD version in many ways; Hana SL was my learning cart and served very well in my system. Windomâs enhanced transparency is something I really appreciate. In the end, it is the music that matters;
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I want to second the comment (by either Elk or Oddeophile - I donât recall) that the Windows version of Windom is superior to the original version that was posted. I preferred Snowmass to the fist Windom for listenabiilty and fatigue reasons, but after loading the Windows Windom I hear the âmorenessâ of Windom but without the (relative) fatigue-inducing effect that was pretty obvious in the original version. Need to give it more time, but it sounds very promising!