Very few people can tell the difference between DACs under blind testing. Most of what they're hearing is psychological... they've decided what they want to hear, and they hear that because that makes them feel good.

I ran a blind test in a room full of audiophiles. It was a professionally treated listening room with PMC speakers (IB2 I think which is a pretty high-end speaker) running from Bryston amps which are pretty unarguably the best amps you can buy. The converters were all top-end studio converters rather than hi-fi converters but principally the same thing.

Converters were tested in blind and people were asked to complete a form as they listened, and identify which was which and which was their favourite. The options were:

• Prism ADA-8XR
• Apogee DA16
• IZ Radar 24
• Burl B2
• Avid 192 (Black)
• MOTU 828mkIII
• Macbook Pro (H/P socket)
• Clickwheel iPod (H/P socket)

Between that lot you have a value enough to buy a house.

The results were absolutely all over the shop with virtually no correlation. Numerous people with 5-figure hifi setups put down their favourite DAC as being the iPod. Generally the favourite was the Apogee but the results were pretty much a bit of everything. The Macbook Pro got more 'favourite' votes than the Prism, which is, on paper, the one credited for being 'scientifically' accurate.

Incidentally in the same room we also did a test with various speaker wire, from QED, Monster, some boutique brands... and also a piece of 1.5mm flex from a £5 consumer grade power extension lead like you'd find behind your TV. The latter was pretty consistently voted the best sounding speaker cable.