That can work a bit if the transformers have limited bandwidth.
But part of the problem is that digital glare is caused by a certain type of distortion called 'inharmonic distortion' which usually does not show up in the specs on a lot of digital gear. Inharmonic distortion is actually a form of Intermodulation Distortion (IMD) in that the distortion is caused by intermodulations between the scan frequency and the signal rather than intermodulations between one frequency in the signal and another in the same signal, although digital does that too.
Older systems had really deplorable performance in this regard; new ones are better and they all have it to some degree. Its hard to detect; the best way is to record a sweep tone from 20Hz to 20KHz from an analog source (if done digitally there are algorithms that bypass the resulting distortion so it appears to not be there) and play it back. The intermodulations can be heard as 'birdies'; little chirps that come and go as the frequency changes.
Normally in music the signal is changing too fast for the ear to hear these things outright, but the ear/brain system does detect the distortions and converts them to tonality, which it does with **all** distortions.
This is why you can turn the treble down all the way (if you have tone controls) and the digital will still have some glare or brightness. The brightness is not occurring due to actual treble energy, it occurs because the brain converts the distortion into tonality and there's no way to get into your brain to stop it.
Obviously the best solution is to get a digital system that does not have so much glare and these days that is really not all that hard to do. Price does not seem to be the mitigating factor either- Oppo makes some equipment that is relatively affordable in the high end audio world and yet in its stock form is not bad at all. Modright does a mod on one of the Oppo players that is outstanding. So there is something for almost every budget.
In case its not obvious, my best recommendation is to find some digital gear that is not so annoying. That will work a lot better than a transformer!
But part of the problem is that digital glare is caused by a certain type of distortion called 'inharmonic distortion' which usually does not show up in the specs on a lot of digital gear. Inharmonic distortion is actually a form of Intermodulation Distortion (IMD) in that the distortion is caused by intermodulations between the scan frequency and the signal rather than intermodulations between one frequency in the signal and another in the same signal, although digital does that too.
Older systems had really deplorable performance in this regard; new ones are better and they all have it to some degree. Its hard to detect; the best way is to record a sweep tone from 20Hz to 20KHz from an analog source (if done digitally there are algorithms that bypass the resulting distortion so it appears to not be there) and play it back. The intermodulations can be heard as 'birdies'; little chirps that come and go as the frequency changes.
Normally in music the signal is changing too fast for the ear to hear these things outright, but the ear/brain system does detect the distortions and converts them to tonality, which it does with **all** distortions.
This is why you can turn the treble down all the way (if you have tone controls) and the digital will still have some glare or brightness. The brightness is not occurring due to actual treble energy, it occurs because the brain converts the distortion into tonality and there's no way to get into your brain to stop it.
Obviously the best solution is to get a digital system that does not have so much glare and these days that is really not all that hard to do. Price does not seem to be the mitigating factor either- Oppo makes some equipment that is relatively affordable in the high end audio world and yet in its stock form is not bad at all. Modright does a mod on one of the Oppo players that is outstanding. So there is something for almost every budget.
In case its not obvious, my best recommendation is to find some digital gear that is not so annoying. That will work a lot better than a transformer!
