DSD sample files

Four one-bit streams for proving out a DSD chain end to end. Drop them into Decaud (or any player that speaks DSF), watch the format badge, open the signal path, and see what your DAC actually negotiates: native DSD over PCM on capable hardware (the Direct Mac edition, and since 1.5 an opt-in USB path on iPhone), honest decimation everywhere else.

The files

Variatio 5 is the same performance at three modulator rates, so you can hear (and measure) exactly what changes when only the rate does. Tags and cover art are embedded. Files are large; that is the format.

Also published as shasums.txt.

Where they come from

Kimiko Ishizaka, The Open Goldberg Variations. Bach's BWV 988, recorded on a Bösendorfer 290 Imperial at Teldex Studio Berlin in 2012 and given to the public domain under CC0. No rights reserved, by anyone, anywhere. It is the rare recording you can copy, host, convert, and share without asking.

We modulated the 24-bit/96 kHz studio master to one bit with an 8th-order delta-sigma modulator (the open-source sox-dsd). So these are true DSD bitstreams with a PCM past: perfect for exercising a transport, not for arguing about provenance. Decaud's own TrueHz analysis will tell you the same story, because that is the point of it.

What to try

• The badge: each file shows its true rate (DSD64, DSD128, DSD256) in the Songs list and now-playing.
• Native DSD: on the Direct Mac edition, select your DAC, turn Exclusive mode on and confirm its DoP support; the signal path then shows DSD over PCM with no conversion. On iPhone in 1.5 and later, connect a USB DAC you have confirmed supports DoP and enable “Native DSD (DoP) on this USB DAC” under Settings ▸ Audio Output, with the iPhone volume at 100% and listening volume on the DAC. The Mac App Store edition converts to PCM; other routes use PCM whenever the requirements for DoP are not met, and the signal path says so.
• The rate ladder: play the three Variatio 5 files back to back; the signal path and your DAC's display should step 2.8 → 5.6 → 11.3 MHz.
• Casting honesty: AirPlay, DLNA, and Chromecast cannot carry DSD; Decaud converts and labels it rather than pretending.

Where is DSD512?

Decaud imports, badges, TrueHz-checks, and plays DSD512 files. Whether the output is native depends on the carrier: macOS has no ASIO, so native DSD travels as DSD over PCM (DoP), and DoP carries 16 DSD bits per 24-bit frame. DSD256 needs a 705.6 kHz carrier, which good USB DACs expose; DSD512 needs 1.4112 MHz. A DAC's native DSD512 rating alone does not mean it offers that carrier to CoreAudio. When the carrier is not there, DSD512 plays through precise decimation, labeled as exactly that in the signal path, and the same arithmetic applies to any macOS player that uses DoP. Decaud sets no ceiling of its own: on the Direct Mac edition, native DSD512 needs a DAC you have confirmed supports DoP, Exclusive mode, a readable DSD file, and a successful negotiation of the 1.4112 MHz carrier with a compatible integer format. Otherwise playback uses labeled PCM conversion.

Native DSD, recorded as DSD

Nothing recorded natively in DSD is old enough to be public domain, so the files above are conversions by necessity. These labels host free native-DSD samples on their own sites, under their own terms: