Using CD players for transports
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- čas přidán 20. 03. 2018
- How much difference does the transport make? That's a question hard for Paul to answer without a whole lot of setup and weaseling around but he finally gets down to the nub of it. Have a question you'd like to ask Paul? www.psaudio.com/ask-paul/
- Věda a technologie
You know you're listening to an honest person when they don't actually recommend their own gear but others equipment that would be more suitable.
I'm sure Paul didn't lose one sale but he and his company gained a lot of respect. :)
Agree or disagree with this gentleman's ideas (on cables for example) I love his passion and broadly agree on working your way back from the speakers. Great philosophy
Love this channel, always learn something, and I enjoy the conversational style
You are Awesome... this was exactly what I am dealing with at this time!
Answers are difficult, but understanding is harder. You made it easy!
Good Job!
In 1974 or 5; my first significant purchase after part timing at a local flower shop for 8 months, were a pair of large Advent speakers. I instantly fell in love with their balanced tonal qualities (they have all been reconed.) They are not ported and have a nice tight base end. Within a year I had saved up enough to buy a second pair. Advent's sales literature pitched either just a stereo pair, or upgrading to the Double Advents wired in parallel which drop the OHMs from 8 to 4. After 50 years , I still love their sound. 15 years ago purchased a third pair (making them triple Advents) along with an additional Yamaha 150W amp. You benefit from the tweeters being separated 8 feet apart on each tower creating an awesome soundscape & presence. High fidelity in the 60's & 70's, shied away from about 10% 0f the high frequencies because you only revealed the hiss and limitations of recordings made into the mid 60's & 70's. As LP recordings improved , LP cartridges, brought us the additional high end. 15 years ago when I bought my third pair and the additional amp, I added two Radio Shack tweeters and they were pretty good. However, I learned about JBL super tweeters. I bought 4 concert blue triangle JBLs and unhooked the Realistic tweeters with a limiting capacitor , and wired them through them. Those those babes sing their hearts out. I figure I have about about $4,000, into this flight of imagination set up. I think it's still the best thing I've ever heard. and my friends who have heard it would agree. I'd rather buy more records than more expensive equipment. So my question is, should I buy a pair of crossovers. The realistic only has one capacitor. I sounds and works fine, it doesn't distort or clip. Would buying a proper crossover make a difference? Thanks. Steven Pettinga, Indianapolis.
I love your candor and honesty not to mention your lack of hype. Great going.
I have found, for my system, using a BDP205 as my transport /DAC, perfect. There are many ways to achieve a balanced system, and we're fortunate enough to have so many choices. If I had a better or different DAC I would use the BDP203.
I have about a 3k system and you can see in my last review I released today of the emotivs basX A-300 that I use a mid grade cd player that has a toslink optical out coax output and analog rca output but I run an optical out to a schiit dac and it sounds great this way !!! I was very stunned but what anout a sacd player ?
You always reassure me, that I am making good choices in my gear and cables. Best, D.
How do by pass the dac in cd player that I have hook up to my recivier Yamaha exit 680 which has a good dac install
What About the red book? Do these new bd players follow the red book when playing music cds?
If you are not afraid of tweaks; try installing a precision clock. It transformed my Teac VRDS 10.
an audiolab 6000cdt is under 400 pounds and sounds amazing
I didn't want to write much on the chanel, but i just have to say now, that it is an amaizing one!
Thank you sir!
Yes l love this program.Paul is good teacher.
Whats your take on cyrus cdi...
Thank you for your very honest opinion Paul !! I see that very useful, otherwise people tend to spend more money without any possibility to see results in their home audio environment.
As always, a keyword is value for $$$.
Thanks Paul ;)
This questions bothers me too. I use a Yamaha 300 CD player as transport only into my Schiit Yggrasil DAC. How could a dedicated transport be better? The bitstream from a CD is as it is and the DAC reclocks it. I can image that there is something to earn if you use a transport and DAC than can be connect to an external clock. But that is not the question here. What does a transport to the digital output that a decent CD player does not do?
Do you like your yamaha cd 300 ? What is the sound digital output vs analog from that player ?
@@audiophilipp The signal from the DAC fed from the coax of the CD 300 is much better then the analog output of the CD 300 of course, although it is already quite fine for a 300€ player. I never cross tested it with another CD transport and I wonder why there should be a difference.
So are players like say a Music Hall c-dac15.3 or Emotiva ERC-4 player not going to benefit from a low end DAC, and only use something like a Schiit DAC if you have a cheep player?
As for better speakers, I really enjoy my ADS L800s (and Stax headphones) and find I am more often displeased by some content be it vinyl or CD than I am the ability of my speakers.
I can tell you have not had experience with this. The Cambridge CXC was a significant improvement over a older NAD CD player as a transport with a Schiit Bifrost Multibit on my system. Bear in mind that I am using Senn HD800S headphones.
Hi Paul, Enjoying your channel! New here. Are you giving away your new book still? Anyway, question in regards to using High Quality CD player Tubed! And the option of using it as just a Transport via my Berkeley Alpha DAC I! Not sure exactly which I prefer at this time! Both have awesome resolution and wide Soundstage! But with the CD player I get my Tubes and Analog Volume Control! With just running as Transport I am not sure what I am losing if anything! I am also using a Synchro Mesh Relocker by Empirical Audio that reduces the Jitter and I can hear that difference! So is there an advantage to either way in your expert Opinion?😊
C.E.C. transports are my fav. too bad they are sold here in the U.S. anymore.
You are just great!!! Greeting from Queretaro, Mexico, where can I found information/specs for speakers (Watts, etc) I trust you but I want to have specs for audio measurement. A big hug!
Thanks, Hector. Are you looking for specs on our speakers? They are on our website.
Hello Paul, I hope you have the time to reply to my question.
I have a 20 year old Marantz DV 8300. With some problems: display doesn't work, coaxial digital output works but with intermittent lapses. Strange. But the CD part works fine (fingers crossed!).
So. I've played CDs with the internal DAC of the Marantz, and with a SMSL DO300, with optical cable.
With the SMSL it's noticeably better, clearer.
Should I consider getting a CD transport, like the Teac PD-505T, and get an even better sound?
Just to put the limping Marantz to rest ... 😉
I don't know anything about the Teac PD-505T so that's a tough one. My guess is it's not much more than a separate box solution so you might instead consider getting a new DAC. There are some great and affordable DACs out there.
@@Paulmcgowanpsaudio thanks Paul, for the reply. Since a few months I have the SMSL DO300 DAC, it has a ES9039MSpro DAC chip. It seems to give a clearer sound than the internal DAC of the DV 8300 (probably a Burr Brown).
I'm using a SMSL AO200 mk Ii amplifier, quite happy with it, if only because of the good looks of the two stacked on each other, and the XLR interlink between them.
In a week my trusted old Marantz SR14, aka the tank, will be back, repaired. So then I can compare those two amplifiers, the old and the new.
Maybe I'm just playing around... too many CDs I still have to play and enjoy!
I think I'll just keep using the DV 8300, as long as it goes.
Or you could be lucky enough to pick up an old Rotel CD transport with a Philips swing arm, single beam laser mechanism for virtually nothing - like me.
I agree with Paul, on my current system the difference is minimal, but maybe next year. A top class source is always a good place to start. GIGO.
Ohhhh ,,,, that's how. Now I get it, thank you, Pall.
I have a pair of HD800S and an RME ADI-2 DAC FS being fed by the COAX output of a DVD player I got from Goodwill for $10 and it sounds amazing
Is that where they make Tang? As for the other thing, They make everything and I am their best customer. My house is Schitt, my car is Schitt, my audio is Schitt, even my job is Schitt.
Which hard disk is better for audio? Seagate or Western Digital?
Neither - Samsung SSD all the way. Just playing along.
Kelvin Park - I just installed an in-memory music server with 7TB storage.
hey paul cau you make video about convert radio am fm to metal detector please
Im confused. Why would you need a dac and a cheap blueray player?
the guy already has a cheap bluray player. And he already has a cheap DAC. The bluray player will read the Audio CDs and send the digital signal to the DAC. His question is should he spend money to get a dedicated Audio CD player. Which the answer to the question is, NO what a waste of money. Just keep the current set up and invest in better speaker.s
Someone told me the CEO of Schiit Audio was Horace, the CFO was Bull, the treasurer was Chicken, and the company was located up Schiit Creek.
Schitt Audio makes a couple of great hi fi audio components especially DACs from what I've heard. There is also is a turntable in production.🎼🎵
The Sol turntable has been discontinued
Speakers 1st best advice ever
When did people start using the term "transport"? Never in my life heard it used until I came on this channel.
Then it means your system is not revealing enough :) just kidding.
Using a cd player as a transport is when you use the use the cd player to simply read the digital data and send it the receiver or preamps dac.. through the coax out or optical out .. (I think) basically the CD is not using it's own DAC.
Oh cool. That makes sense. Thanks! I have a Marantz PM6005 that I make sure to use the dac on whenever I can, cause it's pretty amazing. For my price range, anyway.
CD transport is the part that reads data and sends that data to a DAC. A DAC can be in the same box or externally. Live and learn, my nigga.
CD transports differ as they don’t have any analogue or digital to analogue components in them or any filters to improve the analogue sound. Instead they pass on the digital audio signal straight on to a DAC or an amplifier with a DAC via digital outputs like coaxial or optical outputs. Connecting to an amplifier or DAC via the digital output means that the signal remains in its original digital form for as long as possible, unlike traditional CD players.
As the signal remains digital and turns analogue at the very last minute and with a minimum of extra cables and connections, the signal will suffer less from analogue signal deterioration. This way the sound you’re hearing is much closer to the original recording. Some CD players do also have digital outputs so they can be used as a transport too.
Source: Cambridge auto
This is why (to me anyways) any cd player with Coax out will be fine as for a transport, no matter how cheap they are .. as long as the digital signal is moved out through rhe coax or optical out, the DAC that reads the signal and converts to analog is where the the good or bad sound is made. I dont see how a transport makes any difference to the quality of tje recording. Digital is digital. As long as it is read and transferred.
Emotiva ERC players are amazing.. I've had the ERC 1 and ERC 2
Agree. Transport is about the last thing I would never go for. Because I use Audio PC to rip CDs.
Get an ancient NEC external SCSI cdrom, the ones with the caddy. Super cheap and they work great for a transport.
I've always liked the idea of repurposing old tech like this. Should I ever put together a full system as opposed to my all-in-one Denon RCD-M41 hooked up to Grado cans I will consider this option.
Just be sure to use a DAC that can remove any timing jitter.
I have my Rotel RCD 05 connected to my Cambridge CAX60 by coaxial and digital. Interestingly, the RCD's DAC (although cheap player) has a better, more natural, sound than compared to the CAX60's DAC (admittedly, still pretty cheap amp), which is a little harsher in the higher frequencies and less conving soundstage. Meaning, connect yours through both options and compare for yourself before deciding on an upgrade. But I would suggest looking for the best sounding player you can afford at the time, if that is what you decided, for future proofing.
Sorry but I can't hep laughing every time you say "Schitt Audio"! Yes I'm immature.
Great answer!
Sir; what do you mean by "transport"? What is that and what is it for? (I much appreciate the calm and the speed you employ in speaking. So many on-line talk so fast that someone with T.B.I. or aphasia etc. must leave the site.)
Transport is the disc reading part of a CD player. In high-end audio we often separate the two into two units: a transport to spin and read the disc and then a DAC to convert what's read into something we can hear.
@@Paulmcgowanpsaudio Now I understand. Thank you. I didn't know audiophiles could go that far. (so to speak)
Very honest answer, 👍
What i am hearing is that 90 percent of users are going to be fine with a vanilla DVD or cd player hooked up to a mid range receiver and speakers. Maybe just maybe we'd get a better sonic experience if all components were high end and engineered to work with each other and we had a dedicated sound room. But then again, we aren't doing music production or running a theater are we? Let's be honest a 300 dollar cd player is not for the general population....not needed. I think its just hard for us to accept that a 20 dollar goodwill cd player gets it done.
I have to disagree Paul. I had Accuphase dp450, but lps on my Rega planar 10 sounded better. I sold my Accuphase and got Aqua La Scala dac and La diva transport. Result: good cd sounds at least as good as lp. Example: Andre Cluytens lp of Faure requiem sounds identical on lp and the emi cd. Further 1) I’ve ordered the Aqua i2S cable. 2) I discovered esoteric has released this, so I ordered it. Am certain 1) with aqua i2S CDs will beat lp; 2) esoteric sacd (cd layer) will be best of all
I think about this and the impact is more about the sound signature of the DAC. If I use a "reasonable" quality and affordable CD/SACD player like the Arcam CDS50 ($1,200) and run the balanced analog output to my T+A PA3000HV integrated amp then also run the CDS50's coax digital output into my Cary Audio DMS-550 ($5,200) streamer/server. The use of the different DAC's has a profoundly different result with very different sound signatures. Also with this set-up playing SACD's the CDS50 is doing a direct DSD to analog conversion if I go with the CDS50 as a transport the CDS50 is doing a DSD to PCM conversion and then the DMS-550 is doing the PCM to analog conversion. I am not saying one is better than the other but the sound signatures are different. I prefer to go through the DMS-550 DAC's as that is my primary listening source and I like the sonic qualities of it's DAC.
I've done some tests with sound systems hiding behind a curtain 3 different price ranges... can you guess what is voted as the best 95% of the time_
Hmm... I'm going to throw out a challenge on this one. In one of my two systems, I use the CD player as a transport and do the decoding with an entry-level Emotiva pre/pro. My speakers are Elac Debut B6s - again, entry level. Two days ago I replaced my entry-level NAD cd player with a somewhat better Emotiva ERC-3, and the difference is surprising. I hear more air around the instruments, and the bass is better defined and more present. I was listening to Bernstein's recording of Petrouchka last night, and it was breathtaking. And the only difference in this case was the transport. So I'm going to argue that the transport matters even when the system is not top shelf.
John Baker Do it blind and correct for the difference in sensitivity/ volume which is responsible for all perceived differences in audio quality.
John Baker
I agree. Everything matters, all the time. Even things that you wouldn't guess, or even imagine. The 'weakest link' theory only partially applies here.
Having said that, I also agree with Paul in that you will get the biggest bang for your buck by upgrading speakers and working your way back.
Well, when you run a digital signal into a DAC, the strength of the analogue output is controlled by the DAC. That part is constant. If there is a difference in the digital input, then that variable is dependent on the transport, and we are back to the original point: the transport matters.
You hear what you want to hear. If your NAD CD player functions as intended, it will output exactly the same data as the Emotiva ERC-3. Have you even seen a photographer claiming that the image quality in Photoshop depends on the quality of the hard drive or CD/DVD storage medium when reading the images? Of course you have not. A 1 or 0 is a 1 or 0. Don't fool yourself. But if you have a damaged CD, perhaps there could be differences, but a good advice is never to play music from damaged CDs where data is corrupted. It would be like accepting working on damaged JPG files from scratched CD/DVDs as a photographer. Quite meaningless. And remember, if you play the same file from a US$5 USB drive into your DAC, the sound is exactly as good as a US$20,000 CD player using the same DAC. Well, chances are the US$5 drive can beat the US$20,000 CD player because your CD might have scratches that yield damaged PCM sample levels in the output.
No way. I've been buying gear since the 8o's. I've even sold it for 13years. I've owned or experienced dozens of CD players- and current have 3 different players in my system & all I can simply say is this. THE main factor in sound quality in playback is not Just the player or DAC itself - but rather- the unit's Output stage. You can take the same DAC's - and install them in two different CD players - and you very well might get different sounding results based on not only the Power Supplies used in the units - but what type of output stage was used. YES - A 1 or 0 is a 1 or 0. However- Everything in the chain has an effect on the final sound. This - I believe - (IMO) is why some people say - oh I like the sound of a CS4398 or PCM7155 over the WM8740 - it may not Just be The Chipset itself - but rather - the output stages of those particular players or DAC's.
I went from using a Primare CD21 as a transport to a North Star 192 Transport and still can not get over how much of a difference it makes even on my low-midrange ProAc speakers. Not only do I hear more of what is on the CD, but the sound is way more natural and free of digital artifacts.
nakedhand most cd players, even high end ones have poor SPDIF output jitter and noise performance.
What dac do you use ?
I am using a fairly modest NuForce DAC. It beat out an older way more expensive North Star DAC that I trialed in almost every aspect. The experience gave me caution for future DAC purchases. But it makes sense that DAC technology has come a long way and that cost should reflect that. A replacement is due in the near future though.
Why do people believe this garbage.
03:33 Schiit Audio, not Schitt Audio.
Shitter's Audio.
Craw, not 'Craw'
Potato, not Tomato.
@@googoo-gjoob
Lol!
That *still* cracks me up every time! 😆
@@HareDeLune , one of the *ALL-TIME* goodies!
sadly, todays yuutes just dont get it
i have an Oppo 103 player whose disk drive is on the way out. i will have have it looked and and possibly have Oppo send me a new drive for replacement. using the Oppo purely as a CD transport it does a very good job. diffinitely better than streaming. have thought about the Cambridge CXC as well. Oppo engineers know what they are doing and build excellent gear. their transport drives are well thought out. a dedicated CD drive however is designed to spin CD audio disks only. however a DVD require a different drive speed. so one vote for a dedicated CD drive.
I think speakers are usually the limiting factor in a good system becuase they do the hardest job, turning electrical signal into mechanical movement, but the source is key because you cannot add to what has been taken away. You will usually hear a difference from the speakers when you improve the source, even using inferior speakers. Think of it like a filter. If the source produces 10 bits of info, at speakers you might get 7 or 8 of the 10. If your source is only 6, the best speakers in the world won't give higher than 6, most probably 4 or 5.
WHY oh why are modern CD transports so dreadful compared to players of the late-80's, early 90's?? The user interfaces are terrible. The button response is sluggish and the digital displays are rubbish. I still use an old JVC player that is very responsive, has a great track display, and direct track access number keys. Its audio output sounds terrible, but i send the digital out to my AV pre/pro, and it's OK. This does not sound as good as my other high end player, but it's SO much more user friendly for quickly popping in a CD and playing a particular track number. Why is modern design so anti-button? Buttons are not expensive, so it's really a conscious design choice to not have them. Do people fear too many buttons?? I dunno. I want to have more control of my system, not less.
You haven't seen anything yet, the next generation will have no buttons at all, not even a power button, all control will be via a mobile phone app, or via a 'smart speaker'
So eventually you will end up with a perfectly good player/transport that you will have to just throw away because the control app will have become too dated and the latest 'smart thing' will have forgotten all about it. (Just like trying to conect a 15 year old scanner to a Windows 10 computer)
i had a Theta Data
I agree 100%.
I have a Dell tablet as my transport and the Schiit Audio Modi DAC connested to it. The sound is better than awesome.
you can put a CD into your tablet? what kind do you have?
@@herrtrigger7220 I rip my CDs and put files in the tablet. Idiot.
@@raffiequler7510 then it isn't a transport. No need to be so rude.
What'z a transport? Like a Mac Truck?
Some Blu-ray players have good transport in them.
True. I have oppo 95eu and sound is really good
It's 'shiit' like Senator Clay Davis pronounces it.
I don‘t listen to CDs anymore - i rip them in high quality on my computer and put the music on my media server
Playback is being done by streaming the media directly to my DAC
So i have absolutely no need for a CD player or a CD transport anymore
I have no use for a computer so I use a CD player
Didn't I watch this about a week ago?...or am I losing it?
It was deleted probably 10 minutes after uploading, but I don't know the reason. I just noticed it.
subwoofer x1 then x2 biggest improvement for the money transport way down the list
Pune, India is pronounced “Poo-Ney”
IMHO traditional CD transports are a waste of money. It is best to extract bit-perfect data from the CD using a CDROM drive with a program such as Exact Audio Copy. I get fast, bit-perfect extraction using my laptop CRDOM drive. Once you've got the data, then you can spend money where it matters: the DAC, amplifier, and speakers/headphones.
One thing I've found with bit-perfect files from the CD is that the mastering of some CDs is quite sloppy. You can fix things yourself which a good mastering engineer might correct, producing audible improvements, using Audacity or Audition.
Thanks for the good words for India. I’m Indian ;-)
I love Chicken Tikka Masala. Congratulations.
Well...I am sorry to say that I do not agree with you fully...yes you are correct when the transport will be used in a more resolving system the sound can be noticeably better. But a audio transport has similar level of importance as a dac. I have my chromecast audio, blueray player connected to same external dac via toslink and they sound different and the latter one is way better!! I can hear it in my budget setup so anybody can.
No you can't.
Yes using Nad cd and and oppo Blu-ray as a transport I can hear much difference between the two
Strange how views on system building vary so much pending on whom you listen to. I was always a believer in garbage in garbage out or if the sound isn't being sent to the speaker from the CD/Record deck/tape system,then the speaker regardless of cost or manufacturer won't recover it. Some very, very expensive players of old where nothing but cheaper sony/phillips transports in some fancy and very large case work that suddenly went from £300 to £3000. It is a subjective issue and as our hearing is individual it needs us to listen to kit and pass judgement before purchase if possible.
what is a cd transport? You mean a CD player?
No,. A CD transport is just the transport mechanism, the spinning disc part that delivers only a digital audio signal. It then requires an external DAC. It's half of a CD player made into separate components.
Truth finally
I hate that non-argument: if you don't hear the difference you don't have a revealing enough system or you are deaf. This can be invoked under absolute every circumstances, even when there is no difference at all, even if you know there isn't. It's the perfect way to show your superiority + humiliating the interlocutor. Engineers measure. It may be tricky to measure but if you perceive, it can eventually be measured. As much as I like watching you Paul - and I hate to say this - you MUST know there are false statements you make from time to time (business requires this I am sure and understand). I am still in search of a very good quality manufacturer that still does cold science, care to recommend one? Or does cold science and measurement exclude very good quality audio equipment making? "you'd hear a remarcable difference here" - that was a bit too much for the old engineer in me ;)
Usersky007 I totaly agree with you. I am a retired sound enginer, musician and HiFi lover. Pretty often Paul,s technical comments or teaching are not 100% correct. But I love Paul, I watch him every day because of his personallity.... i
I just wanted to clear my conscience. If I understand we all agree we sometimes cheat then I can fully enjoy the daily show (that I really follow daily :)
Devil's argument here: since there is no ISO or industry standard for what constitutes "good sound," or frankly a lot of consumer electronics related measurements in general, even if the differences were measurable what value would they have to the consumer?
Product spec sheets across all industries, not just audio, are rife with measurements that show a particular product's superiority relative to the competition that in reality do not mean anything at all. Example, THD measurements in DACs are largely irrelevant. Monitor manufacturers constantly publish G2G response times even though there isn't a standard on how those tests are performed, nor does it tell you anything about the real world performance of the panel.
Even if some manufacturer did discover some new measurement that equated to better sound, without verifiable third party studies to prove that x measurement correlates to a perceivable increase in fidelity, you're still taking the manufacturer's word. And, in the snake-oil filled world of audio, if you come up with some proprietary measurement methodology that only you know how to perform, what's to stop you from simply lying?
Sound, like taste and most other things pertaining to the senses, is a subjective thing and ultimately the end goal of designing an audio product is to *sound* good. I know engineers like to live in a world where everything is neatly and perfectly quantifiable in numbers, math, and formulae but things in the real world rarely work out to be that neat and tidy. How many of our best and brightest minds, how many millions of dollars of R&D, and how many years have been trying to perfect our CFD software? And yet, we still use wind tunnels. We'll get there one day for sure, but for the uber-niche world of high-end audio that day probably isn't today.
It's just like food. I'm sure you can measure why a dish tastes better than another, but virtually no one has tried. You can tell me that, say, this bowl of ramen has 24% more monosodium glutamate content than another. And while that may tell me that one bowl has more umami than the other, it doesn't necessarily tell me whether or not one tastes better than the other. You can tell me that one amp has a 0.001% THD and the other has a 0.1% THD, but that doesn't really tell me anything either. Witness my headphone tube amp that has
I agree and appreciate what you say. Still the engineer in me feels we can try and learn and measure. What i deeply appreciated in Paul's video is one when he tells that one can walk near a place where live music is goind and and can instalty say: this is live. I know the felling, it happened me mode than once, but still the atheist engineer in me feels we can figure out this eventually, measure and reproduce.
The problem with "you don't have an enough resolving system" is that it could potentiialy end every rational conversation. If you use it you simply trash the conversation. It may be valid but still, it kills any sensible conversation.
Transport what?
Two “i” and one “t” in Schiit. Just sayin’.
Pronounced 'SHee-IT'.
He’s makes that error every time he spells out Schiit. I’m starting to think it’s deliberate.
3:35 SCHITT or schiit?
Is it someone's name? "Schiit". If it is, and in that case, why call it after someone's name when they can call it anything they like?
It’s rather simple. There is absolutely no reason why playback of digital audio should allow data errors in the reading and transferring of data from the storage medium to the audio decoder and DAC. Keep CDs free from scratches and dirt, and data is reliable. Even cheap PC CD readers 20 years ago were reliable in reading data. Hard drives and solid state drives are practically free of data errors in this context.
ThinkingBetter jitter from the coax. But I believe that you hit the limit quite early one
taief miah Jitter is not an issue in modern equipment either. The available data read speed is well above the audio decoding speed allowing crystal precision of the PCM level clocking to the DAC. Any digital music player suffering from timing jitter is just really poorly engineered. But some issues can arise if you feed a compressed audio signal to a decoder e.g. AC-3 in an AVR via SPDIF which has no flow control.
Does it even use the DAC with optical out?
I have a MASH player that definitely sounds better than a 20 year old PC CD-ROM, but I put it away after I started ripping CDs.
No, a CD player does not use its DAC if you use its digital output. The DAC is on the receiving end of an optical cable always since optical (TOSLINK) is digital. Neither TOSLINK or coax digital interfaces support any means of flow control. This means your decoder (if compressed audio) and DAC will have to "eat" the data at the speed data is received while trying to maintain a precise sample rate into the DAC. Since the DAC has to output the samples at a constant sample rate to avoid jitter with data decoded through software/DSP code (when compressed audio), you can find some designs introducing jitter as the incoming data and the clocked DAC are not entirely staying at the same clock and will have to calibrate with some algorithm to avoid buffer overflow or under-run. In a design where your decoder can control the rate of reading data from the data medium and keep a constant precise crystal based clock feeding the data to the DAC, you can avoid timing jitter entirely.
Sure I understand all that fairly well, but I would have thought the buffering caught up, for CD anyway, around 2000.
As far as cheap players go, you're right they work fine when everything is clean, but those old CDs just aren't going to last, You're going to want to copy them off while you can. But anyway every CD ROM I've ever seen, other than the ones that are way too spendy, just suck at reading disks that are anything less than perfect. I got at least one CD with tiny little holes, you can see light right through it.
Our India is great.
That would be Schiit - not Schitt
Paul, you must LOVE crowds and traffic if you loved India. If that's the case, get on a plane to Jakarta - you'll be in seventh heaven ;)
This subject amuses me. Rather than agonizing over a CD transport, why not just bypass the mechanical features of a transport entirely? Just rip the CD files to a non-lossy format and play the files directly from a computer, outputting the bits over usb to a good DAC. You can't get a better front end than this.
Apparently USB does suffer from a lot of noise so much that not only there are complaints but Gigabyte makes motherboards with supposedly noise free USB ports specifically for external DACs. So high quality internal sound cards with their own DACs and amps and all in the right slot could be a safer bet than those useless (for computers, especially for the lack of features) overpriced DACs for the placebo effect of the audio-snob, even on the theoretically high EM noise environment. I had an X-Fi Xtreme Music, cero noise (ecxept while playing, but doesn't matter), then it broke and had to use an old yet good sounding (to me) Audigy SE, lot of noise (but not more than usual while playing, ha!), but I'm not sure where that noise comes from. And the Audigy refuse to work in the other slot...
But, hey, some audiophiles are so smart that they use stereo DACs (or receivers) for multichannel movies (and games), convincing themselves in their abolutely absurd minds that somehow magically in some of the audio chain or all of it, due to divine audiophile will and miracle through audiophile grade quipment, all those channels (even object based audio stream maybe haha) converts to a "3D sound" without any processing. Because magic. So "no need for sound cards" they say, "gimmick" they say...
But back to your comment while I agree in the computer use. To me, generally the computer is the ultimate player but then there's the problem of the computer fans making noise...Fanless PSUs and CPU coolers are not the best things, then HDDs make their own noise (there are alternatives, like using servers in another room, or using SSDs) and GPUs without fans are low power (I think GTX1050 non Ti is the more powerful I saw). That and the fact that many people don't use computers for various reasons (including not having idea and not wanting) makes this things possible.
I really don't think the "resolving power of your system" is going to make any difference here. The digital bitstream will be the same coming off a high end transport or a reasonable quality CD or DVD player. The reason to buy a really high quality transport is to impress your audiophile friends or to enjoy how smoothly the tray opens and closes. A DAC can matter. An AMP can matter. Speakers definitely do matter. Cables and transports don't.
Get on with it.......
Hi Paul What A nice Cd Player you are Using for Click bait of the Video.
I have on like it Cyrus dAD3 ;-)
I like listening to Paul, but I do get tired of him crapping on other companies & competitors products.
I would think that if I owned my own business, I would want to project confidence in my own products and distaste for those I found inferior. I would be curious to see how his products measure up to those he criticizes.
The best cd player i've seen as a pure transport was the Reimyo CDP-777 which had the legendary JVC/Victor XL-Z900 transport mech, K2 Extended processor, some nice r-core tranny's by Kitamura Kiden, Combak Corp isolation and wiring & a solid chassis provided by Kyodo Denshi. The XL-Z900 transport was probably the best rbcd transport ever made.
The Reimyo CDP-777 was my "if I win the lottery" CD player.
Very natural sounding
Paul cdplayer is a lousy transport, it's all electronic now with computing devices...cd is dead havent you noticed? ;)
A US$5 USB flash drive is hugely more reliable and better sounding than a US$20,000 CD player if you play the same music file and use the same DAC.
$5000 Transport, "10101101"
$50 CD Player, "10101101"
Oh, yeah! Number one sounds so much better!
Should we do a double blind test?
Nah, I'm convinced it was money well spent. I mean, it was ONLY $5k.
you do not have any idea how electronics deal with the 10101101 loaded with extra 111 or 010111 as noise and jitter
@@Andrew-do4jy specialy these 0 and 1 are square wave electronic dont deal very well with sqare wave it see it as a bunch of harmonic the dac as to convert that and make sense of it all if the disk is warped the focus as to keep trying to focus the beam constantly at 400 rpm i guess the focusing system is quite involve
@@Andrew-do4jy i kind of think reading a cd is quite a challenge
same sound when you hook it to your shitt audio!!!! lol
India, great place unless you are one of the many poor who live there.
do you hire afro-americans? great videos, btw
What kind of question is that?
🤣🤣🤣What the hell? The Civil Rights Act prevents him choosing whom his company associates.
india what a great place.. with their caste system, poorness... disease, overpopulation, wars etc.
Hi Paul, every respect with what you are doing but verry often you are just verry much WRONG!
If you loose it in the beginning it is lost for ever! Having good source equipment is mandatory, and not like you are advising starting with the speaker! I am verry dissapointed with your advices pretty often......greetings.
+Paul McGowan I am subscribed to your channel becase I do like your personallity and your sense of humor. I learned few things here and there, but sometimes you call things wrong and incorrect...... I did not want to argue with you because you are who you are and the vieuwers will always go with you. So it is waste of time for everyone.....I like the fact that you seem like very down to earth guy and not arogant at all. I would really like to visit you one day as I plan to move to the USA in 2-3 years. I live in the Netherlands now.
I think Paul is right in this case, invest in speakers first, most electronics are very good nowadays. I def go for speakers first, it gets easier every step after that.
+PROJACKED well, you are wrong. The speakers are also good theese days, listen to Steve Guttenberg, you can buy discent speakers for few hundred dollars. If you invest in an top Wadia player, 1000 dollars amp and just 300-400 dollars speakers you will get better sound. Buying good interlink between source and amp is also a must.
Actually resolution got better with speakers, and ' good'sounding speakers is relative to taste. Lots of cheaper speakers yes, but it still remains a fact that your speakers are your sound board. A Wadia or 1000 dollar amp only improves dynamics not it's frequency range. It's the frequency range you have to worry about. Hence go for speakers first. Make your choice(s) in speaker resolution, then focus on the electronic resolution.
I have been focused on sound for a very long time, and it always comes back to the speakers.
I know Paul is right, he found the shortest route loooong before I did.
Even Paul admits that his own speakers aren't the 'best', but they're damn good.