[mr_bill]

Hi,
I have an SB3 hooked up to my Benchmark Dac1 via an Illuminati D60 digital cable.  Files are on my computer in Apple Lossless.  Prior to the SB3 I used my Sony DVP S7000 as a transport and this is regarded as a good transport for CD's.

As an experiment, I played around with Rush Feedback CD played as a disc through the Sony and streamed via the SB 3.

I used the Illuminati cable and Benchmark DAc for both listening sessions.  I have no preamp and use either front end directly into my Rowland M501's and then into my Sony SS M9ED speakers.

I can tell you that I found both transports virtually indistinguishable.  I had some change over each time between the SB3 and the SOny and I tried to get levels the same, but I really had a hard time hearing any difference between the two.  The Sony sounded a slight bit different, but it was very marginable and I couldn't define it.  I found that I liked the SB3 to Benchmark better than the Sony to Benchmark.  No great reasons, just sounded a touch better.

I'm sharing this experiment, however brief it was, to see if others have experimented like this too.

This gives me great faith on hard drive playback via the SB3 and a good dac.

Bill

[Daygloworange]

Is the SB 3 stock, or modded?

Cheers

[mr_bill]

Is the SB 3 stock, or modded?

Cheers

Everything is stock.
bill

[ted_b]

How was the Apple Lossless file ripped?  Did you use something like EAC or simply iTunes?  The reason I ask is that if an iTunes-ripped cd sounds equivalent in your tests, I bet an EAC-ripped one might even beat the Sony transport.  It all depends on how much work the ripper needed to do; the EAC is up to more work; iTunes defaults to some pretty poor error-correction levels if error correction is required.

[mr_bill]

How was the Apple Lossless file ripped?  Did you use something like EAC or simply iTunes?  The reason I ask is that if an iTunes-ripped cd sounds equivalent in your tests, I bet an EAC-ripped one might even beat the Sony transport.  It all depends on how much work the ripper needed to do; the EAC is up to more work; iTunes defaults to some pretty poor error-correction levels if error correction is required.

I ripped with the standard ITunes.