Multidisc players - exactly how bad?

brj · « **on:** 19 Jan 2004, 02:14 pm »

Hello everyone!

As I sit here and contemplate my ultimate home audio system, I occasionally find the pragmatist in me beating up on the purist. For example, I will often want to listen to music while up wandering the room/house, and can't really make use of that "perfect" sound available in a 6 inch sweetspot... sometimes, I just want the music to play for hours without having to swap discs...

So with this in mind, I thought I'd ask - just how inferior are multidisc players compared to single disc players? I understand the need to reduce jitter, but does no one make a CD, SACD or DVD-A multidisc player that could at least be modded into audiophile acceptability? I'm not talking about a 400 disc changer here, but the 5 disc carousel or 6 disc cassette types (although I haven't see these lately).

Many thanks for your thoughts!

-Brian

Carlman · « **Reply #1 on:** 19 Jan 2004, 02:54 pm »

Brian,
Sony's $200 300-disc player has a digital out which could go to a nice DAC. The Sony wouldn't be the best at extracting detail but, it wouldn't be horrible, either. I've also been quite pleased with some cheap Kenwood carousels. I thought they sounded quite nice.

I used to have 2 cd players... one for storage and one for critical listening. Since my DAC had 2 inputs, I used the coax input for my 'good' cd player and the digital optical for the Sony. I liked the arrangement for a while.. but, I sold the 300-disc'er to get other gear.

-C

brj · « **Reply #2 on:** 19 Jan 2004, 03:36 pm »

Thanks for the post, Carlman.

I guess I was wondering what you would end up with if you started with something like a Sony SCD-C222ES ($500 MSRP) or SCD-C555ES ($800 MSRP) and let one of the different mod shops take a crack at it. Assuming you tweak the standard things like damping, upgraded caps, upgraded wire, upgraded power supply, etc., how close do you get in audio quality to a similarly modded single disc player?

I guess the question gets even harder when you look at some of the digital domain jitter control or clock-locking/correcting upgrades found in some DAC's and/or transports. With these technologies, is the additional jitter introduced by a multidisc player still an issue?

Of course, I'm assuming jitter is the reason you don't typcially see multidisc players.... is there another reason that I might have missed?

Note that the use of Sony above was just an example - I really don't know who makes decent multidisc mechanisms/players.

-Brian

BeeBop · « **Reply #3 on:** 19 Jan 2004, 09:07 pm »

I would think that if you put a jitterbugger like the Monarchy DIP between your DAC and the jukebox, you would cut the jitter somewhat. The Monarchy people claim that they can cut jitter by 80% when fed an optical signal through TOSLink.

earlmarc · « **Reply #4 on:** 19 Jan 2004, 10:57 pm »

The Sony SCD-CE775 is an excellent CD changer with SACD thrown in. Once modded by Larry Moore this player easily competes with any player up to $1500. In fact, during the CES Show 2003, Larry Moore's modded Sony went blow for blow with a heavily modified Sony SCD-555ES by Mathew Anker at SACDmods.com and came out on top by all who observed. The 555ES is stereophile a class A digital front end in stock form.

Fathom7 · « **Reply #5 on:** 19 Jan 2004, 11:44 pm »

Voice of experience here.

I've been saddled with multidisc players for years now (WAF on a new level)

. There are units out there that can extract the info that you can then pump the through some various hoops and out the back end comes great sound.

Current system includes a modded Sony SCD C555ES that puts the redbook stuff through a jitter box (in this case an Audio Alchemy DTI Pro3 32) then on to a Muse 2 Plus DAC (I love having HDCD decoding capabilities).

The stuff that comes out the back end is very sweet.

I've also got a Parasound 1500 multidisc unit sitting in a closet in debate over sale

-- no SACD capabilities but it does come with an IEC recepticle which does make a difference when a good PC is installed

. This unit served well and truly and NEVER used the internal DAC -- always through external stuff.

As always, YMMV but the concept is that you can have some cake while eating some.

F7

manek · « **Reply #6 on:** 20 Jan 2004, 04:37 am »

denon makes good changers

brj · « **Reply #7 on:** 20 Jan 2004, 05:58 am »

Thanks for the feedback!

The impression I'm getting is that any shortcomings inherent to the mechanics of a multidisc player can be substantially countered digitally. If this is the case, I'm surprised that they aren't more common outside of mass market products. I would think the convenience of such a player would help outweigh the cost of the additional electronics...

What else am I missing?

-Brian

bubba966 · « **Reply #8 on:** 20 Jan 2004, 06:02 am »

I had a very nice 301 disc Pioneer Elite CDP (PD-F19). I only ever had the digital out connected, and it worked well that way.

And it was also much quieter than the Sony carousels. I can't believe how noisy the Sony's are. The Pioneer certainly isn't silent, but was a good bit quieter.

I only sold it as I never used it (I really don't listen to CD's). I didn't need to have something else to sit around collecting dust. Already have enough other things that do that...

BeeBop · « **Reply #9 on:** 20 Jan 2004, 11:22 am »

Quote from: Fathom7

...WAF on a new level...

WAF? World Armwrestling Federation? Women Against Fundamentalism? Welsh Automotive Forum?

JoshK · « **Reply #10 on:** 20 Jan 2004, 02:47 pm »

Brian,

I understand your dilemna. I had a Sony SCD-333ES (5 disc carousel) for a while at the same time I had the XA777es. The 333 was pretty darn good but no rival to the XA777 ultimately. However, there is more than differences in transport mechanisms at play here and a modded unit would have certainly raised the bar on the 333. For long play the 333 was more than adequate.

Do you already have an external DAC? If so, and it accepts more than one digital input then the solution would be to get a single disc transport and a carousel both, for different uses. You can certainly start out with the carousel for a while and be satisfied. I think they have come quite a ways since the early days. Dampening will certainly help a lot, probably more than even with a single disc.

Thump553 · « **Reply #11 on:** 20 Jan 2004, 03:05 pm »

How about approaching it from a different angle: Rip your CDs to a hard drive using EAC (Exact Audio Copy, freeware) in WAV format. You can then convert them to a lossless format like SHN or FLAC to save some space. Play them back with a cheap, quiet computer as a music server. You can have days of music available with the right size hard drive. Nifty gizmos like a touch screen for input are available. I haven't done this, but am very tempted. Check out the threads in The Square Circle forum for more details.

Fathom7 · « **Reply #12 on:** 20 Jan 2004, 04:41 pm »

BeeBop --

WAF = Wife Approval Factor

jimbop · « **Reply #13 on:** 21 Jan 2004, 09:21 pm »

I'll answer the original question. Multidisc players are "exactly" 78.23 degrees bad.

brj · « **Reply #14 on:** 21 Jan 2004, 10:26 pm »

While I was hoping for some additional input from those that have experimented with this issue, never did I dream of such a well specified answer!

Care to share the method you used to arrive at this number?

-Brian

hmen · « **Reply #15 on:** 22 Jan 2004, 03:52 pm »

I use a Yamaha 5 disc carousel which is connected to an MSB DIP and then an MSB DAC. I'm very happy with the arrangement. If you're going to use the digital out on your CD player you should be OK. I know that the carousel players are not as high quality as a high-end CDP but you can always install a better clock or use a DIP to reclock the digital signal before it reaches the DAC. I've been spoiled by the having the ability to go from disc to disc and being able to program the player to play a series of songs from different discs. When my previous carousel player died I tried a multi-disc DVD player but I found that when you switch discs it takes much longer for the DVD player to read the disc and start playing so I returned it for a CD carousel.