Honestly after listening to everything I have come up with some conclusions. First of all the DSD sound better than the 16 bits for sure. There is more room spatial info & bass in the DSD master when played through the Korg deck into my system. The real problem though is it the player or the actual recording? No way to tell until we have some DSD authoring software but I will say that my playback deck (Denon 2900) is not at all bass shy in normal playback of anything so it does lead me to believe it is just the difference in DSD having more bits. Or to complicate matters even more maybe it is the Korg downsample through AudioGate, regardless it is what it is. I will continue to record in DSD mode and capture as much info as possible, let the authoring software catch up with me when it is ready, I will have 1 bit masters waiting for it when it does
So now for the actual comp itself. I will say that any of these sources sound great to me, I would be happy with any of them personally, it isn't until you start to hear them back to back that you can come up with a preference. Source 1 is Nick's AKG's, source 2 is my C34. The only way I could tell is that my recording peaks my McIntosh amp at certain point in the song & mine is SLIGHTLY smoother, ever so slightly. So what am I saying? Well the C34 sounds alot like 460's, no shock there considering the caps but still pleasant to realize since at times I miss my 480's. So now we have the choice between the Apogee Mini-MP & the Sound Devices Mix Pre. Well pound for pound these boxes both sound pretty close & pack tons of features into their lay outs, the only thing the Mix Pre is lacking is MS capabilities. It is also lacking the ridiculous size of the Apogee boxes, I have run Apogee boxes for years & have always hated the layout but loved the sound. In this comp & I am really pleased to see that my little SD box is as good as the Apogee at a 1/4 of the size. The SD is transformer based unlike the 722 pre-amps & slightly redesigned over the MP according to Sound Devices tech papers. So yes, I am pleased with the purchase. I will continue to test it against the Mini-MP & trust me if the Apogee is the better box I will go back to one in a heartbeat, this ain't a bueaty contest, I want what sounds best. Eventually I may also try a Portico but for now I am pleased with what I got. So I picked source 2, my source but it was damn close. I could go either way & not look back.
Next up, samples 3 & 4. Well sample 3 was the world famous PSP-2 that I have been lusting over but of course can't find. Mikey Jones was kind enough to send me his & I am forever grateful to him. I needed to scratch this itch for sure, I was driving myself nuts trying to find one. So yep, sounds damn good, there is a reason these puppies are so coveted. Gotta love the tranformer sound, small package & rare as hens teeth appeal. Yep, I loved this pre-amp it is really good but I still picked sample 2 over it, they are both very very close when dithered down to 16 bit but when played back at the original DSD authored files the PSP-2 was much worse in the bass response over the SD, just too much of a good thing. Everything else rocked though so I would certainly be pleased if I had one but at least for me now the itch is scratched, I am still content with what I have. Now, this being said if one comes up for sale in the YS I would snatch it up in a heartbeat, I mean I am happy but who doesn't love a little something on the side too
OK, so finally the mighty Korg was on it's own in sample 4. Well as we listened to everything the next morning Nick & I were very pleased with what we heard. He of course said something to the effect of "if I was you I would sell everything else & just run the Korg, screw it" but as we all know Nick is a few sandwiches short of a full picnic sometimes
While he may have been hung over from the doozey of a night we had he wasn't too far off. Honestly the Korg sounds really really good on it's own. I could/would run it as a one box solution & be pleased until I heard the SD, Apogee or PSP-2 with it. The internal pre-amps in the Korg sound mighty fine, possibly better than other bit buckets out there, who knows but they are still a little thin to me.
So I picked this sample second to sample #2. So for me on this night I picked sample 2 first, then sample 4 & finally sample 3. Wow, for me a true shocker. Could all of this be b/c I own the stuff & obviously have an investment in it? I don't think so, I have bought & sold more gear than I can shake a stick at in the past b/c I felt it didn't sound good. I guess my worst mistake was selling my MK4's for 4022's, what the hell was I thinking of! Doh, worst mistake ever. So anyway, I am not afraid to get rid of something no matter how much it costs if I don't feel it performs. In the end, I am pretty happy with what I have, let's get some Panic up here & see how I really feel running upfront Blumlein