"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

I was flicking through "What HiFi" magazine and I came across something very
odd - a series of reviews on *digital* audio cables, for connecting a CD
player to an amp.

There are comments such as "this cable brings across a crisp sound a cut
above the rest"

Now, at this point I have to shake my head in disbelief. Surely a digital
cable about 1 metre long can easily carry a 1mbit data stream with no
errors. Bear in mind ethernet has to carry 100mbits.

It got even worse when they talked about optical cables. There is absolutely
*no* way an optical pulse can be distorted sufficiently over 1 metre that it
could result in an error.

I can only think that the testers suffered some sort of placebo effect, or
they are in cahoots with the industry in order to provide a supply of
customers who will shell out £350 for the "best" optical cable.

Which brings me onto CD players. I always thought that amplifier and
speakers mattered the most, but What HiFi reckons CD players are important,
and worthing spending loads of money on. Now, if you have a CD player in a
half decent Hi-Fi setup then you use a digital interconnect, so really, all
the CD player is having to do is read the raw data off the CD and feed it to
the Amp, and the cleverness of its own DAC is neither here nor there.

So in a £1,000 CD player are you paying for a great DAC (which you won't
use) or simply some very good error correction in the reading process?

I just wonder if this magazine is just designed so that the industry is able
to flog expensive kit.

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

I just wonder if this magazine is just designed so that the industry is able
to flog expensive kit.

HiFi mags have to survive, and for that they need advertising. Advertisers like
to see plenty of star ratings and quoteable comments. Think simple - it's the
magazine that wants to survive. There is no UK Hi-fi mag that is truly
trustworthy in terms of blindfold tests. It's just not done in a scientific way
- nobody wants to do it that way. And despite Martin Collom's efforts, there's
precious little true rankings. Plus the star ratings 'include' value for money,
i.e. they are meaningless in terms of absolute sound. What's new?

=== Andy Evans ===
Visit our Website:- http://www.artsandmedia.com
Audio, music and health pages and interesting links.

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

I just wonder if this magazine is just designed so that the industry is able
to flog expensive kit.

HiFi mags have to survive, and for that they need advertising. Advertisers like
to see plenty of star ratings and quoteable comments. Think simple - it's the
magazine that wants to survive. There is no UK Hi-fi mag that is truly
trustworthy in terms of blindfold tests. It's just not done in a scientific way
- nobody wants to do it that way. And despite Martin Collom's efforts, there's
precious little true rankings. Plus the star ratings 'include' value for money,
i.e. they are meaningless in terms of absolute sound. What's new?

=== Andy Evans ===
Visit our Website:- http://www.artsandmedia.com
Audio, music and health pages and interesting links.

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

On Fri, 2 Jan 2004 17:32:12 -0000, "Oliver Keating"
wrote:


I just wonder if this magazine is just designed so that the industry is able
to flog expensive kit.

Unfortunately, that's about it :-(

There's still room for manoeuver in speaker design, and, to a certain
extent, amplifier design. Apart from that, music is now down to
reading bits off digital media, at a considerably slower rate than
state-of-the-art. So, to keep interest up, snake-oil is the only
answer.

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

On Fri, 2 Jan 2004 17:32:12 -0000, "Oliver Keating"
wrote:


I just wonder if this magazine is just designed so that the industry is able
to flog expensive kit.

Unfortunately, that's about it :-(

There's still room for manoeuver in speaker design, and, to a certain
extent, amplifier design. Apart from that, music is now down to
reading bits off digital media, at a considerably slower rate than
state-of-the-art. So, to keep interest up, snake-oil is the only
answer.

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

On Fri, 2 Jan 2004 17:32:12 -0000, "Oliver Keating"
wrote:


Which brings me onto CD players. I always thought that amplifier and
speakers mattered the most, but What HiFi reckons CD players are important,
and worthing spending loads of money on. Now, if you have a CD player in a
half decent Hi-Fi setup then you use a digital interconnect, so really, all
the CD player is having to do is read the raw data off the CD and feed it to
the Amp, and the cleverness of its own DAC is neither here nor there.

Excuse me? EWhere do you get the idea that a normal amp can handle a
digital data stream? Are you confused by the prevalence of Home Cinema
amplifiers with digital audio inputs?

So in a £1,000 CD player are you paying for a great DAC (which you won't
use) or simply some very good error correction in the reading process?

Both, and you certainly *should* use the DAC in the player. However,
you also get very good error correction in the cheapest players, as
they almost all use the same Sony or Philips transports and associated
electronics package.

I just wonder if this magazine is just designed so that the industry is able
to flog expensive kit.

Now you're getting it! :-)
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

On Fri, 2 Jan 2004 17:32:12 -0000, "Oliver Keating"
wrote:


Which brings me onto CD players. I always thought that amplifier and
speakers mattered the most, but What HiFi reckons CD players are important,
and worthing spending loads of money on. Now, if you have a CD player in a
half decent Hi-Fi setup then you use a digital interconnect, so really, all
the CD player is having to do is read the raw data off the CD and feed it to
the Amp, and the cleverness of its own DAC is neither here nor there.

Excuse me? EWhere do you get the idea that a normal amp can handle a
digital data stream? Are you confused by the prevalence of Home Cinema
amplifiers with digital audio inputs?

So in a £1,000 CD player are you paying for a great DAC (which you won't
use) or simply some very good error correction in the reading process?

Both, and you certainly *should* use the DAC in the player. However,
you also get very good error correction in the cheapest players, as
they almost all use the same Sony or Philips transports and associated
electronics package.

I just wonder if this magazine is just designed so that the industry is able
to flog expensive kit.

Now you're getting it! :-)
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

In article , Oliver Keating
wrote:
I was flicking through "What HiFi" magazine and I came across something
very odd - a series of reviews on *digital* audio cables, for connecting
a CD player to an amp.

There are comments such as "this cable brings across a crisp sound a cut
above the rest"
[snip]

I would treat such comments in magazines is a being 'somewhat unreliable'.
:-)

Which brings me onto CD players. I always thought that amplifier and
speakers mattered the most, but What HiFi reckons CD players are
important, and worthing spending loads of money on. Now, if you have a
CD player in a half decent Hi-Fi setup then you use a digital
interconnect, so really, all the CD player is having to do is read the
raw data off the CD and feed it to the Amp, and the cleverness of its
own DAC is neither here nor there.

The above apparently assumes you have a DAC inside the amp, and that this
is better than the one in the CD player. I doubt that either assumption is
correct in most cases for stereo audio systems. The situation with the
multichannel amps/receivers for AV may be different, though. These may have
digital inputs to allow the unit to process the digital stream from
something like a DVD player. However these aren't (currently at least) the
norm for serious stereo audio use.

So in a £1,000 CD player are you paying for a great DAC (which you won't
use) or simply some very good error correction in the reading process?

There are some differences between DACs due to the varied ways that they
sometimes deal with the digital stream and convert it to analogue. However
these differences may be modest/small in many cases in my experience once
you get above quite cheap players.

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

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

In article , Oliver Keating
wrote:
I was flicking through "What HiFi" magazine and I came across something
very odd - a series of reviews on *digital* audio cables, for connecting
a CD player to an amp.

There are comments such as "this cable brings across a crisp sound a cut
above the rest"
[snip]

I would treat such comments in magazines is a being 'somewhat unreliable'.
:-)

Which brings me onto CD players. I always thought that amplifier and
speakers mattered the most, but What HiFi reckons CD players are
important, and worthing spending loads of money on. Now, if you have a
CD player in a half decent Hi-Fi setup then you use a digital
interconnect, so really, all the CD player is having to do is read the
raw data off the CD and feed it to the Amp, and the cleverness of its
own DAC is neither here nor there.

The above apparently assumes you have a DAC inside the amp, and that this
is better than the one in the CD player. I doubt that either assumption is
correct in most cases for stereo audio systems. The situation with the
multichannel amps/receivers for AV may be different, though. These may have
digital inputs to allow the unit to process the digital stream from
something like a DVD player. However these aren't (currently at least) the
norm for serious stereo audio use.

So in a £1,000 CD player are you paying for a great DAC (which you won't
use) or simply some very good error correction in the reading process?

There are some differences between DACs due to the varied ways that they
sometimes deal with the digital stream and convert it to analogue. However
these differences may be modest/small in many cases in my experience once
you get above quite cheap players.

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

"What HiFi" - can it be trusted?
 

In article , Andy Evans
wrote:
And despite Martin Collom's efforts, there's precious little true
rankings.

Not sure what you mean by the above. MC does sometimes quote a sort of
'magic number' that he makes up to represent if he thinks a given unit is
better or worse (in his view) than others. However this number has no
objective or definable basis so far as I know. Hence I am not sure it means
much as a "true ranking" to anyone other than himself at the time he said
it! :-)

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