[geowak]

What DAC and CD transport combo(rig) are you using now or in the past?
What do you like about the sound? What did it cost you?

I have been thinking about upgrading my CD system and like the idea of the "stable platter" on the Pioneer PD-65 combined with the external DAC, like the Benchmark DAC1. How would that sound? Has anyone ever had that combination?

I am currently using a Marantz DV-6500 universal player that performs all duties (CD/DVD/DVD Audio/SACD).

Thanks for your opinions.

[tanchiro58]

geowak,

Get yourself a Squeezebox 3 and a decent DAC (like Paradisea, Renaissance II or Promitheus DAC) it would be a better idea than upgrade to an expensive combo. I had Elektrocompaniet SE CDP ($3000) then Acustic Art transport and Metronome tube DAC ($4000). But the SB3+DAC (<$1000) beat easily whatever I had before sonically. You should search around in this forum and let see how SB3 and DAC owners opinions. Good luck.

[1000a]

If I had plenty of $$ and was not interested in trying the SB (which to me is a grave and very costly mistake) I would look into a CEC as transport and a LessLoss DAC.  Check out their site they have some very interesting ideas.  There is someone here is going to try their stuff see what he thinks.

For me CDPs and transports are completely dead as for many others, the SBs potential low jitter fiqures alone for $300 should have people running to do research.  and then the convience is staggering but it is really not conveince per say but a whole new way of listening to digital which puts all the creativity and choices in the hands of the listener.

Now to get the SB up to a high level min investment is about 900. for the basics needed, but this will be a 900 player easily out performing 1,300-1,500 players.
the upgrade path can go higher say 1,800 will usually have it slaying 2,600 players and easyily competeing w 4000. stuff.   Its a value loaded way to play digital and fun as hell.
these are my questimates but they are in the ball park of many SB users comparisons to other gear.  so a top notch player at about 1/2 price , the very very best who cares, I don't.  you could probably dump 2,500 into it and have cutting edge or very damn close.

just my op, but its dittoed by many

[pardales]

Computer music server ---> Trends UD-10 ($129) ---> Stereovox HDX2 ($150) ---> Altmann Attraction DAC ($1500). Thousands of albums and artists all organized with iTunes, virtually instantaneous, fingertip access. I'll probably not have a CD player as my digital front-end ever again.

 

[1000a]

are you using the jisco thing with your altman I thought the DAC was about 700. ?

[WGH]

Homebuilt computer running XP Pro ---> USB-Audio ASIO driver ($65.25) which bypasses the Windows KMixer for a clearer signal ---> Foobar2000 (free) ---> DH Labs D-75 digital cable ($69) ---> HagUSB ($109 kit) ---> Scott-Nixon Tube DAC with 3Xac ($325 used).

This setup just makes music and takes the digital edge off. Having all my CD's on a computer makes browsing so easy....and no more buying players that die in a few years.

There is a Benchmark DAC1 for $750 in the Trading Post http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=41980.0 because the seller likes his Hagtech Chime better. I use a Cornet2 and the sound quality of Hagerman products is very, very good.

[mcullinan]

Apple Quad G5 --> Squeezebox 3 --> Lavry DA-10 =  aa
Mike

[1000a]

never been a better time in audio history really good sound is available cheap these days,

trends, t-amps, speakers gallore, chinese tube amps, Dacs running amuck at cheap prices, PC and streaming music (no money spent on tuners), far better starter TTs - projects and music halls at entry prices, anti cables, DIY room treatments, cheap and good subwoofers,  and the morons finally learned how to record decent CDs.

these might be considered the days of wonder, we get closer to our goals, the prices are dropping and room treatments are no longer food for esoteric coversation.

[hi5harry]

audio computer running Windows XP pro,Adobe Audition, and Lynx soundcard just for recording, to The Empirical Audio Off-ramp Turbo 2 to an Audiomeca Enkianthus X dac ( TRL modified). Digital finally sounds like analog in my system.

[JLM]

Use of SB3 requires you to be computer savy (setup is not trival and hiccups happen routinely), makes you computer dependent, and can't listen to a CD without ripping.  Other options requires you to be more comfortable with the computer.

But computer based music servers ARE the present and foreseeable future audio sources.  If you're not a techno-geek, the Olive stand alone music servers are an attractive option.  Mods are available, but void the warrantee.  Either SB3 or Olive options provide internet audio streaming and high quality digital volume controls with remote as nice bonuses.  Unless you add more sources, a pre-amp becomes optional.

SB3 does not reach audiophile grade without modifications.  With Bolder mods, the cost start at around $950  using both digital and analog sections with minimal upgraded power supply.  Again with Bolder, full digital/analog mods and power supply can run over $3000.  And of course you need a computer with lots of hard drive space (about 0.4 MB per CD without backup).  But no need for a separate DAC (the quality can be extremely good and the price jump to go from digital only to include analog is minimal).  Again, mods void the warrantee.

If $1000 - 1500 to get started with SB3 is beyond your budget an Oppo 970 universal player for $150 or www.tweakaudio.com (Ric Schultz) modded Oppo 970 for $500 plus shipping makes sense.  Later the Oppo can move into TV service.  Ric even uses the Oppo's volume control via remote to go directly into power amps.

If you simply want to avoid involving a computer the Oppo 970/Channel Island Audio (Dusty Vawter, see circle below) VDA-2 DAC is supposed to be good combo starting at $750.  One of the nice aspects of Dusty's stuff is the "external upgrades" that are possible (power supply, low voltage umbical power cord, A/C power cord) without shipping, waiting, or invalidating the warrantee.

A promising high-end option, still avoiding computers, would be the CEC belt drive transport with Benchmark DAC (about $2500).  This should put you in rarefied levels of sound quality.

[pearsall001]

Van Alstine Ultra DAC & an Onkyo DX-C390 6 disc changer used as the transport. Superb sound w/ plenty of flexibility.

[geowak]

hey pardales

I am interested in your setup but, uh ,er, not really up to speed with how it gives you the best sound. Forgive my lack of education-really. I always thought that music files downloaded or otherwise on the computer were compressed files, and as such, did not sound up to par with conventional redbook CD, SACD, or DVD Audio.

I do understand how you would avoid the jitter problems with spinning cd's, but are you still using the DVD/CD drive in the computer as some kind of transport? I think it's easy to see the convience of music files on a computer hard-drive. But can you elaborate a little on how this all produces the good sound?

Also-
 1) What does the Stereovox HDX2 do, are they cables? and 2) would this configuration allow me to connect a Hughes (DirecTV) receiver's audio out for playback of the XM satellite station broadcasts?
3) Would either the Benchmark DAC1 or the Lavry DA-10 suffice as a decent DAC?

Thanks

[JLM]

geowak,

Here's some crude, layman talk:

The sound quality from computer based music servers (the generic term for any of these setups) varies, like CD players.  I'd say sound quality per dollar is roughly on par with CD players (waiting for flaming arrows).  Fans of music servers have walked away from SACD, DVDa, and redbook with no regrets.

The computer is much "smarter" than a CD player.  In order to do all the things a computer does, it has to read files faster and repeatedly off any drive until it gets it "right", therefore no jitter.  CD players have much less computing power yet need to read the digital information and convert to analog in "real time".

Music files can be saved in a variety of formats, but fall into three categories: direct copy (from CD, etc.); loselessly compressed (via FLAC being the most popular); and compressed (like MP3).  The first two can be audiophile quality.  Ripping a CD onto your hard drive with EAC and FLAC takes about 6 minutes and of course you can be using the computer for other tasks at the same time.

Direct copies can be made using Exact Audio Copy (EAC, free downloadable software).  Loseless compression can be done with Free Loseless Audio Codec (FLAC, another free downloadable software).  Uncompressed CD's take up about 0.65 MB each while FLAC compressed CD's take up about 0.40 MB.  With the size of hard drives always going up and prices always declining some take the purist approach and don't compress.

Different DACs have different input/output options.  A goggle search will turn up a variety of cable adapters if needed to bring signals in from your cable box.  There are also some lower cost options for converting internet digital into analog for use in your stereo here:

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=42122.0
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=41911.0

If you can think of a need for how to access/convert/play/whatever audo signals someone else has too and probably has already found/invented a solution.

Both DACs you mentioned are more than decent.  Benchmark now has a USB version of their DAC.

[musicman06]

Great thread. I'm currently looking to upgrade from my cheap DVD player and CDP. Currently my computer is at the opposite end of the house from the main home theater so connecting the two isn't practical. However as it was in the old apartment I intend to have the two in the same area again over the next year or so and reconnected. I don't want to commit to Blu-Ray or HD-DVD at this point in the game, so maybe just an Oppo modded would work well. What about just adding a DAC to my current inexpensive about 6.5yrs old player?

[JLM]

musicman06,

Just check the back of your CD player to confirm what output options you have first.  (I have a 9 year old Sony ES that only has toslink out.)  The widely held opinion is that coax connections sound significantly better than toslink.

Unless you need to go really cheap, I'd look hard at either the Channel Island Audio VDC-2 for $600 (that you can upgrade by replacing power supply and cords down the road) or the Benchmark DAC-1 starting at $975.  For another $300 you can get a USB version of the Benchmark DAC-1.  Either Benchmark has a volume control, balanced input/output options, headphone output, and low output impedence for excellent synergy with any power amp.  Both are made in the U.S. and provide excellent sound.

A couple of years back I had a Sony 7700 DVD player which is still well regarded as a transport and an Ack dAck! v.2 DAC that I was happy with, but moved onto a modded SB3.  The SB3 sounded as good fresh out of the box for the same price.  But what do I know, I'm a speaker guy.   

[doug s.]

denon 5-disc changer, (cdp680?  i don't really know), & highly modded art di/o dac.

i like it, cuz i have compared it to highly regarded ($3k+ single box solutions), & it easily held its own - if separate isolation transformers are used for the cdp & dac.  i am not gonna spend silly money on digital, since any improvement will be tiny at best, imo; & i also believe that even the most costly digital cannot compare to even a moderately priced winyl rig, so why bother?  i got into digital late; i have 1k+ albums, & mebbe 100-150cd?  and >50% of my listening is to fm.  so, what's the point in breaking the bank on digital?  i do admit, tho,  to being interested in trying the mhzs cd88 cdp & the musiland md10 dac...   aa

ymmv,

doug s.

[miklorsmith]

Doug - What do you have against the letter "v"?  Winyl sounds like a urinary situation.

Without spinning this into another analog/digital discussion, I am amazed at the range of sonics possible through a simple transport/DAC setup.  I have 5 DACs in my house right now and each has its own personality, easily recognizable in 1/2 a song.

The good ones can be exceedingly good and the lesser ones are noticeably so.  Thus, I disagree with the thought of "why try with digital".  Generally, I think the DAC makes much more of a difference than the transport, though having a transport that can lock the DACs clock seems like a really good idea.

I really like the Squeezebox but wish it had a slicker user interface.

[flintstone]

I'm using an old Kinergetics KCD-55T transport, Stereovox digital cable, Monarchy M24 tube DAC...I've got around $1,100 tied up in it (used).

Or,


An extra computer with Linux operating system, a USB converter, optical cable into the Monarchy DAC.


The Monarchy DAC replaced my old Counterpoint DAC not long ago...I liked it too.


Dave

[doug s.]

hi mike,

a long time ago, before i got married, i shared a house w/a coupla turkish guys for a couple years.  every time there was a word with a 'v" in it, they pronounced it w/a dubyah.  it stuck w/me....  (except they lived in "vashington, dc" - go figure...)

you misunderstand me when i said "why bother"?  what i meant is i am not gonna spend big bucks on digital.  i have tried a few different digital things in my system.  and, i have heard other digital systems.  so far, the art di/o has been hard to beat, at anything $3500 or less.  think electrocompaniet, alchemist & resolution audio one box cdp's, & an audio mirror non-os dac. for direct comparison, & quite a few different  digital pieces elsewhere.  i am still considering trying other digital gear, as i mentioned, but at reasonable price-points...  i firmly believe that my present digital system provides me with at least 95% of all that the most expensive digital rigs have to offer.  probably closer to 97-98%, if it could actually be quantified.

doug s.

Doug - What do you have against the letter "v"?  Winyl sounds like a urinary situation.

Without spinning this into another analog/digital discussion, I am amazed at the range of sonics possible through a simple transport/DAC setup.  I have 5 DACs in my house right now and each has its own personality, easily recognizable in 1/2 a song.

The good ones can be exceedingly good and the lesser ones are noticeably so.  Thus, I disagree with the thought of "why try with digital".  Generally, I think the DAC makes much more of a difference than the transport, though having a transport that can lock the DACs clock seems like a really good idea.

I really like the Squeezebox but wish it had a slicker user interface.

[musicman06]

musicman06,

Just check the back of your CD player to confirm what output options you have first.  (I have a 9 year old Sony ES that only has toslink out.)  The widely held opinion is that coax connections sound significantly better than toslink.

Unless you need to go really cheap, I'd look hard at either the Channel Island Audio VDC-2 for $600 (that you can upgrade by replacing power supply and cords down the road) or the Benchmark DAC-1 starting at $975.  For another $300 you can get a USB version of the Benchmark DAC-1.  Either Benchmark has a volume control, balanced input/output options, headphone output, and low output impedence for excellent synergy with any power amp.  Both are made in the U.S. and provide excellent sound.

A couple of years back I had a Sony 7700 DVD player which is still well regarded as a transport and an Ack dAck! v.2 DAC that I was happy with, but moved onto a modded SB3.  The SB3 sounded as good fresh out of the box for the same price.  But what do I know, I'm a speaker guy.   

This is a 6-7 yr old Technics (Panasonic) CD-changer has optical (Toslink) and analog, no coax. Not sure I believe that Coax is much if any superior to Toslink anyway. I'm currently using the analog connections.