Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

Wally wrote:


Judging by the prices that DACs are going for, I'm thinking that this would
be a good improvement over the existing setup for less than the cost of a
comparable player. My mate's £500 Arcam player has quickly established
itself as something of a benchmark - I'd like to approach, or improve on,
that sort of quality if feasible. My thinking is that, when my existing
player starts to bite the dust, I could look at getting a transport that can
take a timing signal from a DAC. Is it a standard signal for all (most?)
transports/DACs, or is it rather proprietary?

I'm sure an oscilloscope is a much cheaper approach... ;-)

Actually, he's being coy. 'Better kit' in this case most certainly
does *not* include DACs which can't suppress jitter in the datastream,
but they certainly cost a lot of money, and they do sound bad! :-)

Do you mean DACs that use a sync signal to control jitter, as opposed to
those which can take a raw datastream and make the best (or better) of it?
Would a DAC which has a sync output and a bunch of oversampling be the right
thing to go chasing after?


The best value for money in jitter immune DAC's is reputed to be the
Benchmark DAC1 which uses a sample rate convertor in front of the DAC.
It is a little out of your price range at $850 (no UK distributor
either).

I'd forget about word clock outputs for your purpose - very few CD
players can actually use them.

Cheers.

James.

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

In article , Ian Molton
wrote:
On Tue, 09 Dec 2003 16:53:29 +0000 (GMT) Jim Lesurf
wrote:

For my taste the Meridian DACs seem excellent.

Do you know anything about the ARCAM Delta black box 3?

Not really, I'm afraid. At the time I settled for the Merdian I was mostly
comparing with a few 'one box' players like the Quad 67, not with other
outboard DACs. Didn't try any ARCAM.

does it sound good?

Pass. Also 'sound good' tends to be something people argue about... ;-
Hence others (and yourself) might not agree with me on that.

does it have an optical input?

Pass.

Slainte,

Jim

--
Electronics http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Audio Misc http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/AudioMisc/index.html
Armstrong Audio http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/Audio/armstrong.html
Barbirolli Soc. http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/JBSoc/JBSoc.html

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

In article , Ian Molton
wrote:
On Tue, 09 Dec 2003 16:53:29 +0000 (GMT) Jim Lesurf
wrote:

For my taste the Meridian DACs seem excellent.

Do you know anything about the ARCAM Delta black box 3?

Not really, I'm afraid. At the time I settled for the Merdian I was mostly
comparing with a few 'one box' players like the Quad 67, not with other
outboard DACs. Didn't try any ARCAM.

does it sound good?

Pass. Also 'sound good' tends to be something people argue about... ;-
Hence others (and yourself) might not agree with me on that.

does it have an optical input?

Pass.

Slainte,

Jim

--
Electronics http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Audio Misc http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/AudioMisc/index.html
Armstrong Audio http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/Audio/armstrong.html
Barbirolli Soc. http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/JBSoc/JBSoc.html

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

To minimise this effect components should be placed side by side, not
stacked. Most hi-end gear was not designed to handle the effects of
relitivity.

Eh?

Well, by Einstein's principle of equivalence gravity (at a point) is
Indistinguishable from acceleration, so time should be very slightly
faster
for the top component ;)

This **tiny** difference between side by side and stacked is maybe about
as
worthwhile as many other hifi tweaks.

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

To minimise this effect components should be placed side by side, not
stacked. Most hi-end gear was not designed to handle the effects of
relitivity.

Eh?

Well, by Einstein's principle of equivalence gravity (at a point) is
Indistinguishable from acceleration, so time should be very slightly
faster
for the top component ;)

This **tiny** difference between side by side and stacked is maybe about
as
worthwhile as many other hifi tweaks.

--
Jim H jh
@333
.org

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 02:12:49 +0000, Ian Molton wrote:

On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 01:15:00 GMT
"Wally" wrote:

So, what's the difference between async and reclocked? If reclocking is
about feeding back time adjustment info from DAC to transport,

It isn't.

does
asynchronus mean there's some sort of buffering in the DAC?

No, it means that there's no actual clock reference involved.

thats not reality, sorry.

the 'reclocked' signal is simply one that has been resynchronised to another
clock, with bits added / discarded to suit the difference in clock speed between
the spdif clock and the reference one.

Er, no, reclocking need not necessarioly drop *any* bits at all, since
you clock them into a buffer at one rate, and clock them out at
another rate. of course, you do need to ensure that the buffer is big
enough to cope with differences in the clock rates............

BTW, will you FFS get a newsreader that outputs defined line lengths?
Ideally about 70-72 characters.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 02:12:49 +0000, Ian Molton wrote:

On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 01:15:00 GMT
"Wally" wrote:

So, what's the difference between async and reclocked? If reclocking is
about feeding back time adjustment info from DAC to transport,

It isn't.

does
asynchronus mean there's some sort of buffering in the DAC?

No, it means that there's no actual clock reference involved.

thats not reality, sorry.

the 'reclocked' signal is simply one that has been resynchronised to another
clock, with bits added / discarded to suit the difference in clock speed between
the spdif clock and the reference one.

Er, no, reclocking need not necessarioly drop *any* bits at all, since
you clock them into a buffer at one rate, and clock them out at
another rate. of course, you do need to ensure that the buffer is big
enough to cope with differences in the clock rates............

BTW, will you FFS get a newsreader that outputs defined line lengths?
Ideally about 70-72 characters.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 01:15:00 GMT, "Wally" wrote:

Ian Molton wrote:

With the 'async' SPDIF you will hear every bit correctly (and thats
still dependant on the conversion method). with a reclocked output,
given the clock will NEVER be a perfect match for the SPDIF clock
anyway, you are garaunteed to either drop or stretch a whole bit at
some point. ick.

No, this is simply not true - although it depends on an adequate
buffer.

So, what's the difference between async and reclocked? If reclocking is
about feeding back time adjustment info from DAC to transport, does
asynchronus mean there's some sort of buffering in the DAC?

Best plan is a single-box player, where *everything* runs off a single
low-noise free-running master clock.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 01:15:00 GMT, "Wally" wrote:

Ian Molton wrote:

With the 'async' SPDIF you will hear every bit correctly (and thats
still dependant on the conversion method). with a reclocked output,
given the clock will NEVER be a perfect match for the SPDIF clock
anyway, you are garaunteed to either drop or stretch a whole bit at
some point. ick.

No, this is simply not true - although it depends on an adequate
buffer.

So, what's the difference between async and reclocked? If reclocking is
about feeding back time adjustment info from DAC to transport, does
asynchronus mean there's some sort of buffering in the DAC?

Best plan is a single-box player, where *everything* runs off a single
low-noise free-running master clock.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

Add a DAC to a cheap CD player?
 

On Tue, 09 Dec 2003 21:44:54 GMT, "Wally" wrote:

Stewart Pinkerton wrote:

Not 'necessary', but it does help an outboard DAC to approach the
quality of a one-box player. generally, much better to buy a better
player than to use an outboard DAC for CD replay.

Judging by the prices that DACs are going for, I'm thinking that this would
be a good improvement over the existing setup for less than the cost of a
comparable player. My mate's £500 Arcam player has quickly established
itself as something of a benchmark - I'd like to approach, or improve on,
that sort of quality if feasible.

It's feasible, but only with a single-box player! :-)

Try the brilliant Sony NV-900, for instance, which should be available
very cheaply - and it plays DVDs, too!

My thinking is that, when my existing
player starts to bite the dust, I could look at getting a transport that can
take a timing signal from a DAC. Is it a standard signal for all (most?)
transports/DACs, or is it rather proprietary?

No, this is a very rare and always proprietary feature, and doesn't
always work too well (the Linn being a case in point).

I'm sure an oscilloscope is a much cheaper approach... ;-)

Actually, he's being coy. 'Better kit' in this case most certainly
does *not* include DACs which can't suppress jitter in the datastream,
but they certainly cost a lot of money, and they do sound bad! :-)

Do you mean DACs that use a sync signal to control jitter, as opposed to
those which can take a raw datastream and make the best (or better) of it?

No, I mean DAC which typically has dual PLLs, one wideband to ensure
viability with poor transports, and one narrow-band to ensure low
jitter with a good transport.

Would a DAC which has a sync output and a bunch of oversampling be the right
thing to go chasing after?

No, a single-box player will always be superior.

As noted, try Meridian DACs - they sound good and they do a good job
of suppressing jitter. I'm not sure that you'll notice much difference
between the original 203 and the later models, as they always had the
engineering pretty well spot on.

Duly noted.

I still have my trusty 203 in its original box if you're interested,
but I still recommend a new player.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering