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In Reply to: What should I audition (MSRP $4000 - $8000)...? posted by DevilDawgMom on March 4, 2007 at 23:38:56:
Two things that affect sound in a player (in simplistic terms). Jitter in the digital signal and DAC/Output stage. Just changing the DAC is like getting a different flavor. A low jitter digital input is what will change the fundamental characteristic (digital edge, tightness of bass, treble extension) of the player. A DAC/output stage difference affect only the quality of the analog signal. I am not sure, I am getting this across correctly. Low jitter player can be paired with a tube buffer or preamp to modify the nature of the output, but a high jitter player will be flawed in playback totally.
Follow Ups:
Jitter can creep in anywhere. For maximum effectiveness the de-jittering should therefore be as close to the DAC IC as possible.
Mel,
If you transmit the clock separately the cable will not cause jitter. The I2S connection with the Northstar transport/player accomplishes this. BTW, the Northstar is a popular transport in the mod circles. I feel people who get their electronics modded really have an ear for the sound and are not swayed by brand names. Ofcourse, one aim is to reduce costs with mods. But these people are paying $50-10K and I feel this is a good price to equal the cost-no-object, state of the art.
Thank you for your response. Could you provide some specific examples for me to demo/audition?
If I wanted to spend this much money, I would go with this combo. No SACD though. But CDs are going to be around for a while. You can also mod this transport, if you want to. Otherwise, just some power conditioning and power cords will squeeze the last bit of performance out of this.
http://www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/northstarcd_e.htmlI am not into Cd transports/players anymore, as I feel, that Computer based playback is the way to go (using a Bolder modded Squeezebox now, a modded Lavry DA10 is in the future).
This will also take care of cable introduced jitter, as the I2S connection transmits the clock separately. So the cable will not introduce jitter.
using the Revelation Audio Labs I2S cable. Upsampling at the transport to 24/192.I a considering the Empirical Audio mods for this combo, but having so much fun listening to it right now I don't want to send it off just yet.
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