pvadbx;146813 Wrote: > Also, even though I'm very skeptical of these kinds of things, my CD > player does sound better when I put those stupid ISO pads under it > (reducing error rates?).
That's in your head... really - have a friend move the pads in and out while you're blindfolded. > > From all of this discussion, am I to conclude that these differences in > sound quality are due in large part to lots of errors in the real-time > data reading of the CD in the traditional CD player? It's not jitter > (from the above), it's unlikely that it's better quality parts (I don't > think the SB3 has better parts than the Music Hall), it IS probably in > part due to better design, but is it fair to say it's in large part due > to lots of errors coming off the CD transport and not enough time or > error correction information to fix it? When comparing digital systems the biggest factors affecting sound quality BEFORE the amplifier are (from biggest to smallest, IMHO): the format (sample rate etc), the DAC, the voltage regulators, EMI, the output driver circuitry, and the clock circuitry. That ranking assumes NO DATA ERRORS and that no parameters are completely out of whack. Eg if you have a bad output circuit then it doesn't matter how good your DAC is. If you have data errors (which CDs are highly susceptible to, but Squeezebox is not) then all bets are off. However, data errors are usually easily audible, not subtle like the difference between two fairly good DACs. > Fundamentally, why are network based transports like the SB3 better than > CD trasnports? With respect to sound quality alone*, there is nothing** inherent in Squeezebox that makes it "better" than anything a similarly designed CD player could do. As for Transporter, we make the claim that it's better than any CD player not only because it supports higher quality formats, but it also because it vastly outperforms any CD player I know of in objective sound quality tests. That is not to say that if you hooked a CD front-end to transporter's DAC you couldn't get the same performance - in fact, if you used the word clock connection you would get the same performance. * i.e. not talking about convenience, usability, reliability, features, etc. ** Aside from data errors causing clicks, skips etc. -- seanadams ------------------------------------------------------------------------ seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=28621 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
