I’ve been wanting to try the Sonarworks Sound Reference ID for headphones with my CD collection for some time. I decided to use a dedicated Blu Ray Drive connected to the computer via USB using Foobar2000. This allows the Sonarworks program to be the driver (apply the EQ) between the DAC and the Headphone amp. This works very well.
Although I don’t apply EQ on my own, I find the Sonarworks EQ to work very well with the headphones they do support. In this case, the headphones are the HD 600, HD 650, and HD 660 S2. It’s nice to be able to apply quality EQ to a extensive CD collection.
I was concerned that jitter could be an issue with using a computer Blu Ray burner. It turned out to be a non-issue. Makes one re-think the entire CD transport issue. Schiit made a CD transport with USB out that was expensive and had compatibility issues. This setup works very well for CD playback via Foobar2000. The ability to apply Sonarworks EQ is a game changer for improving headphone playback when listening to CD’s.
