CD players are back ?

[ajay556]

CD transports/player are making a come back? Kalista, CEC, hegel cd players have the lowest jitter noise ratio ever seen in digital playback system.  

Since this is a Audiophilestyle forum  now - other sources are not taboo anymore. Keep in mind computer was never designed to play high-end audio - Till today it's more of a convenience - dollar to dollar vinyl and CD player have better sound quality. Just take a peak in japan, France, Korea etc...they are hard core audiophiles and they are still buying CD players and of course turntables.

 

[Blackmorec]

Sorry but I simply don’t agree. I recently implemented a Michell Orbe, SME IV, Ortofon Cadenza Black, so not chopped liver and a well set up Zenith MkII SE saw it off in every respect valued by audiophiles. The reason I chose the TT combination I did is that set up is done to a specification and can be done very precisely and I spent a very relaxing day getting it perfect. The resulting sound was beautiful but the Zenith was better in every regard save nostalgia. Quieter, more dynamic, greater contrast, bigger, more realistic sound stage, greater transparency, no sudden clicks or pops, fewer clues you’re listening to a recording. 

Digital audio has gone way beyond repurposing computers, so these days a computer designed to play high-end audio is exactly what you get....custom mother boards, custom memory resident OSs, SSD storage, playback cache memory, optimised interfaces, highly accurate clocks, low noise (EMI & ripple) linear power supplies for all critical functions, vibration control etc. 

I obviously haven’t heard anything like all the available CDPs and TTs but I would guess that these days you’d need to spend a reasonable multiple on a TT or CDP to beat what’s now possible with digital streaming.  In my case the $ ratio was 2:1  and the TT was nowhere near as good.

 

[daverich4]

I’m not sure how playing back a CD via a device using error correction is going to sound better than playing back a bit perfect rip via computer of the same CD. At any rate, since learning how to rip SACD’s on one of the other threads here I don’t even play those back manually anymore. 

[Miska]

I wonder how many companies anymore make traditional CD mechanisms.

 

Lot of "CD players" I've seen recently use CD-ROM drives designed for computers and actually have computer ripping the CD on the fly and playing the ripped data. That's also what HQPlayer has been doing since the beginning (and doing also doing upsampling on the fly). That provided better playback quality already over 10 years ago, and still does... Since the CD is being read asynchronously and faster than playback speed, the mechanism doesn't affect playback at all.

 

Multi-format players such as DVD- and Bluray-players operate this way too when playing a CD.

 

[ajay556]

There are sever

4 hours ago, daverich4 said:

I’m not sure how playing back a CD via a device using error correction is going to sound better than playing back a bit perfect rip via computer of the same CD. At any rate, since learning how to rip SACD’s on one of the other threads here I don’t even play those back manually anymore. 

Bit perfect (which includes clock)  does not exist in real life  music - -if computer was bit perfect then innuos would not be selling 15k computer transports. There is only less bit imperfection with  better power supplies and clocks. A simple computer is completely bit imperfect.

[ajay556]

9 minutes ago, Miska said:

I wonder how many companies anymore make traditional CD mechanisms.

 

Lot of "CD players" I've seen recently use CD-ROM drives designed for computers and actually have computer ripping the CD on the fly and playing the ripped data. That's also what HQPlayer has been doing since the beginning (and doing also doing upsampling on the fly). That provided better playback quality already over 10 years ago, and still does... Since the CD is being read asynchronously and faster than playback speed, the mechanism doesn't affect playback at all.

 

Multi-format players such as DVD- and Bluray-players operate this way too when playing a CD.

 

Yes CD using CD- roms,  DVD players, SACD etc are enemies of CD playback. This was a marketing ploy. IF you look at the new cd players they use cd only transports/clocks and are far superior in sound quality. 

[diecaster]

13 minutes ago, ajay556 said:

There are sever

Bit perfect (which includes clock)  does not exist in real life  music - -if computer was bit perfect then innuos would not be selling 15k computer transports. There is only less bit imperfection with  better power supplies and clocks. A simple computer is completely bit imperfect.

 

Ok. Another person to put in my “Don’t Know What They Are Talking About” list.....

 

Of course there is bit perfect in digital audio. It’s not hard to read the bits of a CD perfectly. It happens most of the time. 

[Ralf11]

what is a "computer transport"??  Is it the thing like a big truck that they used to move old mainframes with?

[One and a half]

3 hours ago, Miska said:

I wonder how many companies anymore make traditional CD mechanisms.

 

There are still a few being made for the top tier players from Japan where SACD holds its own. Esoteric, Accuphase, Denon and Yamaha feature their own designed drives and 'turntables' for their CD/SACD players. If I've missed a couple, not a real issue, but the rest use OEM pressed metal jobs, mainly found in BD drives. BD drive may play movies well, but are lousy at CD. While I had the Mutec MC-3+USB, the output of a cheap BD drive could be improved by reclocking the S/PDIF through the Mutec, worked well, not enough as a keeper though.

[ajay556]

8 hours ago, diecaster said:

 

Ok. Another person to put in my “Don’t Know What They Are Talking About” list.....

 

Of course there is bit perfect in digital audio. It’s not hard to read the bits of a CD perfectly. It happens most of the time. 

bit perfect concept works when you are loading a word document. Bit perfect in music has another variable  - time...and their lies the problem. So it has no meaning if bit perfect is being retrieved and sent to the destination with timing errors. That's why there are so many expensive sources like innuos. Computers are noisy sources. The innuos minimizes the timing errors by big and clean  power supplies and avoiding switches.

people need to realize electric circuits do not understand 1s and 0s. It is all volts/currents and errors are in various forms.

Consider reading a book on digital circuitry and you will quickly realize how complex this topic is and cannot justify by saying bit perfect.

[diecaster]

7 minutes ago, ajay556 said:

bit perfect concept works when you are loading a word document. Bit perfect in music has another variable  - time...and their lies the problem. So it has no meaning if bit perfect is being retrieved and sent to the destination with timing errors. That's why there are so many expensive sources like innuos and not computers as sources. They minimize the timing errors by big and clean  power supplies and avoiding switches.

people need to realize electric circuits do not understand 1s and 0s. It is all volts/currents and errors are in various forms.

 

Again, you don't know what you are talking about. Noise is the problem, not timing. Noise on the ground line; noise in the power; and clock phase noise.

[ajay556]

48 minutes ago, diecaster said:

 

Again, you don't know what you are talking about. Noise is the problem, not timing. Noise on the ground line; noise in the power; and clock phase noise.

I think you are misunderstanding the word timing - its same as clock...and my point again a bit perfect has zero meaning with a a noisy clock as in all computers. And if you think this statement is wrong then you definitely don't know what you are talking about - Moreover, i have a computer /electrical engineering degree from u of A.  Whats your background - please don't say computeraudiohpile website 😉

[matthias]

https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/jays-audio-cdt2-mkii-cd-transport-listening-impressions.27044/

 

Matt

[MetalNuts]

A well developed drive, no matter it is for CD or mutli-purpose including Blu-Ray, DVD, does not by itself guarantee good SQ.  The drive is just for picking up the data on the disc.

 

Bit perfect also does not necessary ensure good SQ.  It only ensures that every time it plays the data is the same which a CD has difficulty in achieving.  An invisible dust particle or a scratch can make the CD player skip or fabricate data and continue playing.

 

[Blackmorec]

Discussions about timing, clocks and digital noise are fairly irrelevant in this context. Everyone knows that consumer grade computers optimised for games, word processing, e-mails, internet surfing etc have too many compromises to make good tools for high-end audio. Comparing purpose-built TTs and CDPs to regular computers and concluding that the former sound better is fairly meaningless. Compare TTs and CDPs with computer systems designed specifically for high-end audio i.e like to like and the conclusion you likely reach is that the most recent developments in computer-based local and remote streaming knock TTs and CDPs into a cocked hat (are far superior). 

Spend some time and money optimising the data stream and the gap gets even wider. 

There’s one very good reason for some audiophiles to prefer TTs and CDPs and its not absolute sound quality. Lack of knowledge in the areas of computing and networking is widespread enough throughout the audiophile community to support a small niche market in traditional technology. 

[MetalNuts]

To me, CD Players never left.  What device qualifies as CD Players?  I believe all device that can read CD, i.e. CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, Blu-ray ROM are CD Players. 

 

Although CD Players never left, I only use it to rip a CD instead of playing the data directly from the CD.

 

It is unlikely my CD Player will leave unless there will be no more CDs released.

[Blackmorec]

What device qualifies as a CDP?  Basically in my mind its anything that requires a spinning plastic disc in order to listen to music. 

Think about an Innuos server.  In essence its the next generation of CD Player. It spins the disc, reads and stores the data at approx. 6X, shuts down the reader and all associated processing then plays the music on demand from cache memory without all the motors, servos, power supply noise, and vibration.

[Audiophile Neuroscience]

15 minutes ago, MetalNuts said:

Although CD Players never left, I only use it to rip a CD instead of playing the data directly from the CD.

 

Should we say CD Players are back-wards?

[Miska]

5 hours ago, One and a half said:

There are still a few being made for the top tier players from Japan where SACD holds its own. Esoteric, Accuphase, Denon and Yamaha feature their own designed drives and 'turntables' for their CD/SACD players. If I've missed a couple, not a real issue, but the rest use OEM pressed metal jobs, mainly found in BD drives.

 

I really doubt if Accuphase or Denon are manufacturing their own control electronics and laser pickup assemblies for CD. I know TEAC (mother company of Esoteric) used to make one, maybe they still do. Yamaha has resources to do it, but I also doubt they would make one. Very expensive affair for small volumes. I'm not talking about the mechanical part of CD read system, but the laser pickup, servo control electronics and such. These are done using microchips designed for that task. Designing and manufacturing your own chips is extremely expensive. You need large volumes to cover initial starting costs in ball park of $200,000. So not about metal/plastic parts and such.

 

Even when CD was big, there were very few manufacturers for actual CD reading. Pretty much Philips, Sony, TEAC, Toshiba and Matsushita (Panasonic). Everybody else was using the few. Now much less.

 

5 hours ago, One and a half said:

BD drive may play movies well, but are lousy at CD. While I had the Mutec MC-3+USB, the output of a cheap BD drive could be improved by reclocking the S/PDIF through the Mutec, worked well, not enough as a keeper though.

 

Then it is more to do with the computer that did the reading and output electronics rather than the BD drive. Because there's no relation between BD drive and audio clocking. It is reading CD just like a data disc and it is bit-perfect. Clocking related to S/PDIF is entirely on that particular audio interface implementation and doesn't have anything to do with the drive doing reading, when you use BD drive.

 

For example when I play CD with HQPlayer, there's no clock what so ever coming from BD drive, I just read data faster than the playback speed. Then HQPlayer does it's DSP stuff and puts data into large FIFO buffer. Then DAC clocks out this data using it's own built-in clock using asynchronous USB. There's absolutely no difference playing CD, files from HDD, or streaming music over the internet.

 

[Miska]

1 hour ago, ajay556 said:

I think you are misunderstanding the word timing - its same as clock...and my point again a bit perfect has zero meaning with a a noisy clock as in all computers. And if you think this statement is wrong then you definitely don't know what you are talking about - Moreover, i have a computer /electrical engineering degree from u of A.  Whats your background - please don't say computeraudiohpile website 😉

 

But only clock that matters is the one that times the D/A conversion. Before that you only have abstract data no different from a word document or picture. And that critical clock is not running in the computer, it's in the DAC. 

 

[Miska]

28 minutes ago, Blackmorec said:

Discussions about timing, clocks and digital noise are fairly irrelevant in this context. Everyone knows that consumer grade computers optimised for games, word processing, e-mails, internet surfing etc have too many compromises to make good tools for high-end audio.

 

Well, I don't agree with that either. They handle data perfectly well. Sure, there are poorly designed DACs that don't behave well in such environments. But good ones perform perfectly fine.

 

Pretty much all the recordings you listen have been made using such computers anyway... ;)

 

[Blackmorec]

20 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

Pretty much all the recordings you listen have been made using such computers anyway...

 

That’s more a damnation than an accolade. All it really tells you is how far SQ can still improve 😉

 

Most computers vibrate (fans, disc drives etc), produce HF noise  and ripple (SMPSs, motherboard EMI emissions) and offer poor quality interfaces, not to mention poorly optimised-for-audio OSs. Fix all that stuff and they can produce reasonable sound but nothing like as good as a designed for purpose audio processor (or stripped down NUC of the correct series). 

[Miska]

1 minute ago, Blackmorec said:

Most computers vibrate (fans, disc drives etc), produce HF noise  and ripple (SMPSs, motherboard EMI emissions) and offer poor quality interfaces, not to mention poorly optimised-for-audio OSs. Fix all that stuff and they can produce reasonable sound but nothing like as good as a designed for purpose audio processor (or stripped down NUC of the correct series). 

 

Now you only need to explain how that has impact on the performance...

 

Yeah, I make my own optimized for audio OS builds too, but it doesn't always make any difference. For example if I use network to send audio to the DAC it really doesn't. Or over USB if the DAC is well designed.

 

I'm personally not so much for NUCs, they are too tightly packed/crammed and don't have so great CPU performance. I personally prefer for example Gigabyte Gaming-series motherboards that have audio optimized DAC-UP USB ports (where you can also turn off USB power from BIOS settings if you want) and equipped with low TDP T-series Intel Core CPU, everything put into passive cooled case. Storage is M.2 SSD or Optane on the motherboard slot. No spinning discs, no fans.

 

[Blackmorec]

12 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

Now you only need to explain how that has impact on the performance...

 

Yeah, I make my own optimized for audio OS builds too, but it doesn't always make any difference. For example if I use network to send audio to the DAC it really doesn't. Or over USB if the DAC is well designed.

 

I'm personally not so much for NUCs, they are too tightly packed/crammed and don't have so great CPU performance. I personally prefer for example Gigabyte Gaming-series motherboards that have audio optimized DAC-UP USB ports (where you can also turn off USB power from BIOS settings if you want) and equipped with low TDP T-series Intel Core CPU, everything put into passive cooled case. Storage is M.2 SSD or Optane on the motherboard slot. No spinning discs, no fans.

 

Quite honestly Miska, I think we’re both saying the same thing. All I’m saying is that its futile comparing bog standard PCs to TTs and CDPs. But fix all the PC’s problems and they’ll  give TTs and CDP a run for their money, beating them hands down in some cases. As far as I can see, you’re saying the same thing, judging by all the PC optimisations you list.

 

Regarding your point on sending audio via the network, how much attention have you paid to the network components because no matter how good your computer HW and OS, your network will substantially reduce the SQ if it suffers the same issues I listed ie. vibration, noise, poor quality cabling etc. 

 

[alfe]

Why creating a third layer of error correction for rom if CD was bit perfect?