Better sound from quality CD player?

[Brett a]

I am surprised for your comment, since I would describe the sound of my 640 C V2 more on the detailed side, which is something some people complain about. The reviewer of TNT got a similar impression:

http://www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/azur640c_e.html

The Cambridge Audio's character is more towards analytical than musical. There is no way you can call this a 'smooth' player, although it certainly isn't a-musical. It is just that the emphasis is elsewhere with this machine.

About the 740, the same reviewer wrote:

http://www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/azur740c_e.html

It certainly isn't harsh or overly analytic, but detail is definitely favoured over tonal richness in this case.

I am not saying that Cambridge Audio CDPs could not sound as you described, perhaps with some specific gear in the rest of the system, but this is the first time I read that the "house sound" is not on the analytic side, which, BTW, is the way my 640 sounds in my own system. I like this sound and for this reason I'm saving some money towards buying the 840 or perhaps a Naim CDP, which most people wouldn't describe as warm, I guess.

Seems you probably know better than I do (really). I am just going by some brief experiences in my local chop (a dealer of CA, NAD, Rotel, and many others). I've listened to some Cambridge units there and also had them tell me that CA gear has this sound relative to other units they sell.

Still, I'm a firm believer that the opinions of owners trumps "in passing" opinions. So I yield to your opinion.

 

[gewoonmaf]

I've yet to do a blind comparison but all my CD players sound good to me- or at least as good as the CD's mastering and mix allows. Might be that my system's not good enough to hear the difference though...

 

[guiller]

I've yet to do a blind comparison but all my CD players sound good to me- or at least as good as the CD's mastering and mix allows. Might be that my system's not good enough to hear the difference though...

I've done this a couple of years ago to decide which CDP to keep in my main system and could separate them easily into classes. The nex step was harder. The most critical aspects of sound reproduction to me were noticed in reproducing human voice (a capella, no amplification involved or in chorus, without any instruments), acoustic guitar, and woodwinds small ensembles (I used a Mercury recording of Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez and another of Vivaldi concert conduted by Pinnock). Always with moderated sound intensity. Under those conditions I could finally pick up the Cambridge Audio 640 C V2 over the Denon DCD-1650G (japanese market).

A few days ago I reconnected my Philips CD-350 CDP to the main system, and although it is a nice sounding CDP, the differences with the Cambridge Audio were immediate, at least in my system and to my ears.

 

[guiller]

Seems you probably know better than I do (really). I am just going by some brief experiences in my local chop (a dealer of CA, NAD, Rotel, and many others). I've listened to some Cambridge units there and also had them tell me that CA gear has this sound relative to other units they sell.

Still, I'm a firm believer that the opinions of owners trumps "in passing" opinions. So I yield to your opinion.

Absolutely, I have no intention to argue whatsoever about something so subjective as a CDP sound and respect all opinions because I believe that components can sound quite differently on different setups.

 

[Old-School]

Music really is in the ear of the beholder. Recently I started a new job which required me to take a full physical. Including a hearing test. The results said I have mild hearing loss, and cant hear some frequencies.. WHAT??? LOL

Bottom line is that we all hear things differently based on all kinds of variables. Take a brand X model X player in 2 different systems and 2 different rooms with 2 different listeners and you have 20 different sounds. I try to respect opinions also but will share what I have found using various CD players. The same really could be said for any component.

No price range listed for a recommendation, so I will stay around mid-fi. The sky is the limit on CDP's just like anything else.

I like the older Yamaha units, Rotel (RCD-855) and others, and Sony ES. You really cant go wrong with them. Find one with a digital output and you can test out external DACs later.

JVC actually made some good units, like the XL-Z555, XL-Z444. Any of the "Super Digifine" CDPs are good for the money. Possibly $50-$150 used. The XL-V line to me sounds like absolute crap.. and I would avoid that like the plague.

I have an old Emerson CD-175 in my vintage 80's system which (to me) still sounds very good. In fact I cant justify replacing it. Emerson CD players from the 80's were made by Yamaha, so dont let the name fool you. Does it sound like an Oracle CD-2500? No? But it didnt cost 10 grand either. I find that (emerson) player warm and easy to listen to. Same for the JVC, which I also own.

IMO, You really have to stay in a budget of sorts. Its pointless (to me) to spend a pile of money on a CDP when you have entry level speakers or ones not suited to your listening environment. Ditto for amps. Once I played my ARC transport and DAC into my old JVC integrated amp just for testing. Sure it sounded great. But play it into the rest of the ARC system and its way more detailed, warm and seems like the music is alive in the air. Just the cable that links the DAC to the transport cost more than the JVC amp!! So you have to stay in reason with your system. Mega buck digital equipment is a waste on a $100 amp.

My best advice is to try out as many units as possible. Buy and sell them, then stick with the ones that sound best to you, in your budget and your system. Thats the real fun in audio to me.

And remember all of this coming from someone who has verified hearing loss!! LOL

 

[ricohman]

Lots of good advice here. And I am going to keep my eye out for a good used model as mentioned.
I'm not cheap and I will spend for better sound but if I can get a decent player from $20 -$200 it should give me some room to look around.
I will be careful with obsolete parts though.

 

[Brett a]

Lots of good advice here. And I am going to keep my eye out for a good used model as mentioned.
I'm not cheap and I will spend for better sound but if I can get a decent player from $20 -$200 it should give me some room to look around.
I will be careful with obsolete parts though.

I think if you're willing to do some homework and be willing to approach $200, you'll eventually score a CD player that performs on a whole new level above the common $15 yard sale units.

Keep us posted.

 

[js1138]

the issue is with jitter, which comes from the transport

This theory is easy to test. Rip a CD to WAV and use Accuraterip to compare your WAV file to a database of others' rips.

If the WAV file is error free it makes no difference how much you paid for your CD drive.

Once you music in in some lossless format on a computer there will be no more errors until you send it to a DAC.

Considering that external hard drives work flawlessly for years until they die, it is simply absurd to argue that digital data streams are so fragile that they routinely induce audible errors.

It would make far more sense to invest in a good DAC and let the CD player send the digital stream. That way you can have a relatively inexpensive modern CD player that is replaceable.

 

[89grand]

I've not heard of any modern CD player, or computer CD ROM that jitter was measured on, and it was above the threshold of being audible. I'm glad I don't put so much thought into every single little detail in equipment, so I can just put in a CD in either my computers DVD ROM, my old Yamaha, or Toshiba DVD and enjoy the music, because all three of those players sound exactly the same to me.

 

[guiller]

It would make far more sense to invest in a good DAC and let the CD player send the digital stream. That way you can have a relatively inexpensive modern CD player that is replaceable.

Perhaps you should keep in mind that this is a philosophy, albeit one with many followers. Some people take a different one, like some high-end manufactures like ARC or Bryston:

http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showpost.php?p=4041158&postcount=73

 

[js1138]

I've not heard of any modern CD player, or computer CD ROM that jitter was measured above the threshold of being audible.

It can't be audible if there are no errors.

Analog equipment always changes the signal, so it's possible to argue over whether anyone can hear differences.

With digital data streams it's either perfect or not perfect. The methods required to achieve perfection are so well established that it is simply unreasonable to expect errors. How many times do you get hard disk errors? Or errors copying from one drive to another?

The thing is that digital data streams contain error detection and correction information. You can know absolutely if a stream is corrupted. It would be a trivial thing to have an indicator or error counter on a DAC. It wouldn't add five dollars to the cost.

If anyone is paranoid about jitter, they should obtain their music in WAV file format, and play it directly with a good sound card, without using toslink or coax.

Having said all that I can believe that CD players sound different, because I've heard a difference. But only with the cheapest players using the analog output.

What I have trouble with is arguing about which obsolete technology is worth spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on. CDs should be converted to WAV. Argue about DACs. End of problem.

 

[guiller]

Having said all that I can believe that CD players sound different, because I've heard a difference. But only with the cheapest players using the analog output.

The rest of the system chain is important to hear the differences among two different sources, in this case CDPs. It is important to have in mind that one's experience is limited by the gear used. In my case, If I had to express my experience on this point I would say something different.

What I have trouble with is arguing about which obsolete technology is worth spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on. CDs should be converted to WAV. Argue about DACs. End of problem

Not everybody would like to follow this route, for a number of reasons. For example, having an important number of CDs in your collection (I've got 5000+). In my case, I would rather save more money and buy a better CDP, on the 1500 to 2500 $ range.

 

[js1138]

5000 is a lot of CDs.

But I still think the player is insignificant. The only thing that is going to make a difference is the DAC. Assuming you use the player's digital out.

This arena if fraught with mumbo-jumbo. Consider the $3000 DVD player that is just a fancy case with a $500 player inside.

I'm not going to tell people who have money how to spend it, but I will make the case that as long as the signal is digital, money isn't going to buy more perfect.

As for jitter, I have some first hand knowledge of jitter correction. Back in the 80s, home computers stored programs on cassette tape. It was a horrible medium, but it was cheap. I got involved writing a program to save and load programs on tape. Mostly I had to debug a program that almost but not quite worked.

The part I had to debug was the timing correction. Tape has wow and flutter -- timing variations. To recreate a digital stream from analog tape, you have to hunt for the wave peaks and ignore distortion, false peaks and dropouts.

This is all standard stuff in the digital world. The methodology is so well perfected that it is news when anyone has an undetected and uncorrected error.

I can believe that there are defective products out there, but I doubt if they are common. At any rate, it is possible to determine absolutely whether a digital data stream has errors. Any consumer product should be able to reconstruct transmitted data without error. It should also be possible for any critic or test laboratory to determine absolutely whether a product is defective or not.

 

[Ohighway]

The only difference I've ever noticed is when comparing my ancient Sony units against something relatively newer. I can't remember how many years ago it was but I bought a Kenwood CD changer. A CD-206 I believe and the selling point at that time was the Digital to Analog converter. It had the then new "1 bit" converter, and when compared to my older units there was definitely a difference. The older units sounded harsh and grainy, the newer Kenwood.... sounded good! I'm sure I'm way behind the times and that there are even better Digital to Analog converters to be had in the newer units. Someone who is more knowledgeable can chime in and enlighten us.....

 

[Brett a]

What I have trouble with is arguing about which obsolete technology is worth spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on. CDs should be converted to WAV. Argue about DACs. End of problem.

No, that would be the beginning of a lot of problems (or challenges). My computer is 10 years old and still serves me very well. It's also on the other end of the house from my system. So I'd basically have to buy dedicated hard drive(s), a laptop, a DAC, and then spend literally hundreds of hours dumping my 2000+ CDs onto it. And why exactly would that be a good thing to take on?

It's a lot cheaper, easier and quicker just to spend $400 +/- on a used high-end cd player and enjoy the music.

 

[guiller]

This arena if fraught with mumbo-jumbo. Consider the $3000 DVD player that is just a fancy case with a $500 player inside.

Several people here have different views on this, and it would be easier for everybody to acknowledge their existence and not assume that one's point of view is the only acceptable one. For example, disregarding other people's intelligence because they take different decisions. Do you really think that somebody spending 3000 $ on a redbook CDP (not DVDP) is a fool that pays a lot for nothing special?

This topic has been discussed a number of times without consensus. A very good thread regarding this discussion is this one:

http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=323603

 

[js1138]

And why exactly would that be a good thing to take on?

Not the best thing for everyone, perhaps, but people should know it's an option, and they should at least be aware of some indisputable facts.

Fact number one: you can get all 2000 CDs, error free, on one external HD.

Fact number two: you can play everything on the HD with a $100 media player that takes USB hard drives.

Fact number three: you can make a backup copy of everything on the HD simply by copying the drive to another. No need to hover over it.

Fact number four: Even the cheapest media players will have toslink or coax outputs to feed your expensive DAC.

Fact number five: Once your music is in WAV or FLAC format, it will never develop scratches or fingerprints. It will be perfect forever, so long as you keep a backup copy.

Fact number six: the cost of hard drives for 2000 CDs is under a hundred dollars.

Opinion: You will be able to find different quality media players and different DACs in varying quality and price ranges. The DAC is the only place in the chain where errors are likely go undetected and uncorrected. To me, that is the sensible place to spend money.

 

[Andyman]

I know very little about what makes/models give the best sound for the buck, and I'm going to buy used.
Any recommendations?

Buy a used DVD player for $5-10 and give it a shot. The DACs in them benefit from newer technology and sound very nice.

Can't beat it for the price.

 

[js1138]

Buy a used DVD player for $5-10 and give it a shot. The DACs in them benefit from newer technology and sound very nice.

Can't beat it for the price.

Here I'm going to differ again. Aside from portable CD players, the one bad player I've heard was a rather recent "upconverting" DVD player. This same player sounded fine from its toslink output.

I have no argument with the claim that DACs sound different.

 

[trhee]

The player is significant. A DAC is not the only aspect that contributes to a player's sound. The transport and laser are 2 important parts that many people seem to naively dismiss as not being a factor.

But I still think the player is insignificant. The only thing that is going to make a difference is the DAC. Assuming you use the player's digital out.

The idea that a $3000 DVD or CD player is nothing more than a $500 player with fancy casework is just so wrong. Does that make a Nissan GT-R nothing more than fancy bodywork over a Nissan 350Z?

This arena if fraught with mumbo-jumbo. Consider the $3000 DVD player that is just a fancy case with a $500 player inside.

What is perfect? The whole marketing campaign of CD since it's birth was "Perfect Sound Forever". As we have hopefully learned, there is no perfect sound and there is no forever. While I agree that spending more doesn't always buy you better, spending more can buy you better sound, even with digital. By your logic, since digital itself is perfect, there will be no difference between any digital gear. That is plain out simply false and wrong.

I'm not going to tell people who have money how to spend it, but I will make the case that as long as the signal is digital, money isn't going to buy more perfect.