They don't use Burr Browns on the DVD-A1UDCI. They use newly developed 32 bit AKMs.
Yes, I know that the new A1UDCI does not use Burr Browns
Ahem! Yup, thanks for keeping me honest. I guess, the essense of my thought was, that those most excellent DACs will be bypassed when using the digital out options.
The purpose of bypassing the DACs and using digital in the first place is to keep the signal lossless and within the digital domain all the way thru the pre-amp within the receiver and avoid the losses of converting it from analog to digital and back to analog for the final amp. If the owner decides to use the analog outputs and the player's DAC, then connects to a Denon receiver, the signal must be converted back to digital in order to use all the features of the receiver--things like DSP, height info, distance to the speakers, AL24 &32 processing and the equalizer.
You are absolutely correct. I want to add that, it is best to keep the D-A, A-D (if at all) conversions to a minimum. One has to decide which to use, the AVR/ pre-pro or the source in which to do the D-A conversion. When I used the my Denon 3910 for audio, it did all the DAC and processing (crossover, distance, etc) duty and fed analog to my Denon 3806 via the pre-in while it ran in Pure Direct mode, since the DAC in the player was far susperior (
on paper) than the receiver. FWIW, Gliz already mentioned, all these "audiophile" improvements are heavily outweighed by things like room response, placement, toe-in, etc. Consequently, in only the most carefully set up audio conditions (speakers
and room) can the difference in the quality of the DACs be established (if at all). IMO, some of the differences are well beyond the capability of human hearing. Best of luck trying to determine the difference between 0.001% THD and 0.00001% THD at whatever audio freqency you desire.
I must disagree with the statement that the full measure of the A1UDCI cannot be appreciated by using only the digital outputs.
Did you mean to say Analog outs here? When using digital outs, you are just sending bitstream to an outboard DAC. In this situation, a WalMart BDP will be no different than the Denon. Why? How? Because in the digital domain, a 1 and a 0 do not have quality, they are simply either desiphered as such or not (perhaps stating the obvious). So, as long as the player can faithfully read the media and stream the info, the outboard DAC will get the same information irrespective of the "class" of the player. Had the WalMart player not been able to faithfully do the job, indeed, just as well as the Denon, the very palpable effect would have been distorted audio.
I did subjectively feel D.Link did sound better but only when I knew it was actually engaged so it could be placebo or me being mesmerized by the 3 blue lights
Meaning, the digital out sounded better (for whatever reason). There might just be a very logical explanation for it. So, my followup question is, what was the outboard DAC being used?
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Last but not the least, not to flame anyone, IMHHHO, folks complaining about load time and contemplating power consumption need to get a reality check. This player alone costs more than some folks spend on their entire HT, video, audio, decorations and carpeting included. The folks that will actually purchase this player dont give a flying fish about these "issues". If it produces absolutely the most pristine video and audio the 10-20 seconds extra to load a disc dont seem that much of a problem when you have to wait for the $20K Runco projector to heat up anyway and what is a few extra watts of power consumed when you are pushing amps that probably give off 1.21 GigaWatts in heat the whole time
. Again, not being argumentative, just a realist.
