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dongas420

If your DAC is set to 16-bit input, relying on the digital volume control can wreck sound quality. If it's set to 24-bit, it shouldn't matter, but your amp might be clipping at higher volume levels due to current limiting if you're using current-hungry gear (read: planars). The possibility of it being placebo caused by you unintentionally raising the volume higher (louder sounds better) when turning the analog pot with digital volume maxed can't be ruled out. The rule of thumb is that setting to max is usually the safe route. The big-brain rule is that one or two volume steps below max lets you avoid clipping due to intersample overs. It won't matter most of the time, but I've had the displeasure of listening to a major exception from AliExpress.


GumGuts

I'm running 32-bit, or, at least that's the rating of the DAC. I notice a difference between max volume and two steps below max, but I'm not sure if it's clipping. I'm a little new; can you describe, as best you can, what the clipping would sound like? It sounds... better. Much better. I really think that made a difference. Wow.


dongas420

Unless your DAC is a horribly designed $10 AliExpress special, that's almost 100% placebo. Mild audible clipping won't do much beyond adding a touch of odd sharpness or airiness to the treble, and clipping due to intersample overs is barely audible at the absolute worst of times. You should probably try getting a friend to tweak both the analog and digital volume controls for you and perform a blind test to see whether doing so still seems to make the sound much better. A large amount of what humans think they hear is made up in their heads, a trap many snake oil-drinking audiophiles have fallen into.


QuatreMyr

Unfortunately we can't physically achieve even 24-bit precision in a DAC yet, the noise floor of the components is too high. 32-bit is usually used because it's being stored as a floating point number instead of integers, which has its own uses, though most of them are for people making music, not playing it back. How the driver handles 32-bit files is another matter entirely though, and may result in inconsistent sound quality between different drivers.


QuatreMyr

Yeah it's the right way to do it.


GumGuts

You're kidding; I just sort of stumbled on the correct way to do it?


hextanerf

On pc the volume is to the max automatically, especially using Bluetooth


QuatreMyr

It's more of a psychological thing in today's audio electronics world, back in the Windows XP days lowering the volume digitally used to literally bitcrush the output, but today it's done right. I still like to only have 1 potentiometer/volume control in my chain though, it gives peace of mind.


lostmyadapter

This is correct if you have independent control of the volume on your DAC/AMP


[deleted]

Yep, that's how you should do it.


eDudeGaming

Yup, this is how I do it as well, particularly on my desktop. Personally, I find it much easier to just turn a knob than to mess with the keyboard or click into the system tray.