Question on "Audiophile" CD players

[DaleAV]

OP, Nibhaz's points are right on the money. And his first suggestion regarding room treatments should be heeded, IMHO. You'll gain much more in audio performance from that kind of investment.

Last year, just for fun, we ran a blind test on a small, clunky, $10 Sears yard-sale CDP against a highly praised, modded, smooth-as-silk JVC XL-Z1050. When corrected for output levels, no audio difference could be detected. While it wasn't hard science, our little experiment convinced me of the benefits of buying a feature, aesthetics, or cost driven, but not a "performance" driven CDP.

Good thoughts! Of course, the quality of the playback equipment needs to be such that differences would be more distinguishable. I am not saying there should have been a significant difference, on the contrary, but in my experience some quality HD-DVD/BD players do sound better with CDs than some older CD players to my ears.

 

[mtrycrafts]

Wait a minute...the message you were responding to specifically talked about FR being flat to 10Hz. Are you really saying that being flat at sub-10Hz frequencies is an important consideration?

It is really meaningless since the ears have a rather very large threshold of detection and JND and climbing as the frequency drops; one only needs to see the charts One reason why 10% distortion is used to measure subs, it just doesn't matter at those frequencies

 

[mtrycrafts]

As you know, Soundstage is a term that refers to the ability to hear music the way it was recorded (how instruments and musiciens were placed in a room/on a stage). Its not a set value you can adjust. ....

Try to alter the phase shift between the left and right channels and see what happens.

 

[mtrycrafts]

.... I am not saying there should have been a significant difference, on the contrary, but in my experience some quality HD-DVD/BD players do sound better with CDs than some older CD players to my ears.

Perhaps the comparison protocol is lacking? Perhaps it was not bias controlled? Level matched? and on it goes?

 

[Tomorrow]

Good thoughts! Of course, the quality of the playback equipment needs to be such that differences would be more distinguishable. I am not saying there should have been a significant difference, on the contrary, but in my experience some quality HD-DVD/BD players do sound better with CDs than some older CD players to my ears.

It's easy to get caught in a trap here, Dale. There truly can be a difference between what one might believe he or she experiences in an audio system and the results obtained from a controlled, blind testing, particularly with instant switching (since auditory memory is quite short). Perceptual auditory testing and research has a habit of reshaping what one's biases have come to believe about this hobby.

If you haven't run such a test for yourself, I highly recommend it. Also, Nibhaz or Mtry should have some handy reading references/peer reviewed papers they can provide which might prove interesting to you.

 

[DaleAV]

It's easy to get caught in a trap here, Dale. There truly can be a difference between what one might believe he or she experiences in an audio system and the results obtained from a controlled, blind testing, particularly with instant switching (since auditory memory is quite short). Perceptual auditory testing and research has a habit of reshaping what one's biases have come to believe about this hobby.

If you haven't run such a test for yourself, I highly recommend it. Also, Nibhaz or Mtry should have some handy reading references/peer reviewed papers they can provide which might prove interesting to you.

My test was A/B side by side. Switching 2 ch stereo analog receiver inputs with a remote.
A Toshiba XA1 player against a 3 year old Memorex CD player.
2 Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon. Not quite synced, but certainly close enough..
Not talking huge differences by any means, but to 'ME' the Tosh simply sounded better.
I would gladly have the Memorex sound better, or at least identical. I've never considered any DVD player to be an ideal CD player, and against another CD player, expensive or not, the results may well be different (as in 'the same').

As far as 'bias'..one can certainly have the 'bias' that there will be no difference also.

YMMV

 

[jostenmeat]

Yeah, I've had the guys come out with pitchforks and torches when I told them I bought a nice cdp that sounded better to me.

FWIW, Gene has reviewed certain cdp's, and yes reviewed them to sound better than another.

Lastly, it's very common in the 2ch world to not have any digital ins/outs, like optical, and then the cdp's analog section does come into play.

Nevertheless, I think it's one of the last places to blow any money on. And I think nibhaz's posts are on the money.

Still, with extremely transparent classical recordings on my pretty transparent stereo system ($$$$$), with 150lbs of acoustical treatments just on the front wall, I'm pretty sure I could double blind pick the two players out, if I got to choose the recordings (which would consist of vocal motets/masses if I had to put money on the line). But then again, one of them is tubed. The Denon 1730 it replaced sounded distortive and sibilant. I had zero money set aside to put into the cdp, because I drank the AH koolaid, but I was simply disappointed after spending so much on the speakers. Since the cdp replacement, I've pretty much done nothing to the system in over a year, except for acoustical panels.

Connected via analogs to a Cambridge integrated.

 

[DaleAV]

Panels are good, as is EQ is properly applied along with optimum speaker locations. It's about as good as anything you can do.
Hopefully, a reasonable room to start, because with some rooms it seems you can not do enough!

 

[valvesnvinylfan]

Re: Audiophile CD Players...

As someone who's listened to a good number of audiophile CD players and DVD/Blu ray players, I've gotta say I've heard huge differences, even under blind conditions. I didn't always believe in the differences; it took someone to blind test me a long time ago with music I knew before I started looking at differences in them. After that, I became a big believer in that old Ivor Tiefenbrun quote, "If you haven't heard it, you don't have an opinion."

Once I started listening to them, what I found was interesting, to say the least: Some of the audiophile players were absolute dreck, some were amazing. But this was also my opinion of the mass market DVD/Blu ray spinners I've heard as well. I've got a Marantz $500 retail DVD/CD/SACD player that outperforms an older Nakamichi CD player that was over $2k in the late 80's. Yet my Sony SACD player (also $2k retail) handily beats them both on regular CDs--at least I and the others who've heard them compared blind and at matched levels think so, even though we were all hoping for no differences.

But I do agree on a certain point: some "Audiophile" CD players are crap, snake oil, and absolutely not worth the money. But not all of them are, just like not all low-priced, mass market players are junk either. The one trend I've definitely noticed with digital players is that, as a whole, the ones that are out now are better than similarly priced ones from even five years ago.

Regarding the measurements, etc., it's interesting to note that no one has yet mentioned digital/word clock jitter which can be measured and heard and can be a large contributor to sonic differences between different CD sources. Some folks seem less sensitive to this than others, but maybe that's down to differences in hearing. There's a couple of interesting web articles out there, one at stereophile's site on jitter (at "reference/193/jitter") and also one on how it's measured at benchmark media's site, ("appnotes-d/jittercu - dot html.")

Anyways hope this adds something useful.

-Oliver