Other: Big Buck CD Players

[Paul Mather]

Steve Swann wrote:

> Too true.  I went to a big electronics store (one in Buffalo called
> Stereo Advantage, that had a room with literally about 60 models of
> CD players), and I took with me a set of headphones whose sound I
> was familiar with, and a number of my favorite CDs.

I take it you were listening to the headphones through an amplifier
headphone output.  CD player headphone amps are *notoriously* bad;
usually they're just an afterthought, thrown in for convenience.  To get
the real sound of the CD player, you really ought to hear it amplified
through speakers, unless you do most of your listening through headphones
anyway.

> What I found much more significant was the ease of use.

It depends if you want something that sounds great, or something that is
easy to use. :-)

(I know, we want both.)

> The audio rags make far to much of a fuss about the difference of
> sound between CD players.  I guess it's because they have to justify
> their existence by talking about a "new" topic every issue, so they
> follow all the latest D/A converter black magic, and make a big deal
> out of it... but frankly, mid range CD players are mostly within 1% of
> each other in terms of sound quality, and the high end models are
> within about .1% of each other.

Well, the signal processing I learned recently as part of a digital image
processing class gave me a greater appreciation of the problems of
digital audio.  But like I said in another message, CD players aren't
totally digital devices; many people seem to underestimate this, and come
to the conclusion that "all CD players must sound the same" as a result.

But I agree that there is probably less subjective difference between
various brands of CD player than between other types of hi-fi components.

> already noted, you'll get 100x as much difference by changing
> speakers.

Meaning there is a vast difference in colouration in different models of
speakers.  This isn't necessarily a good thing, IMHO.

> If I had to make a single recommendation: buy a high end Sony.
> They're as reliable as all get-out, and they have very nicely thought
> out user controls - something often missing in the more exotic
> "audiophile" CD players), and which you'll appreciate more and more
> as you own the thing over a period of years.

I have heard lots of bad reports about Sony reliability.  However, I have
never owned anything by Sony, so feel free to disregard this warning.

Cheers,

Paul.

obCD: The Brain Surgeons, _Trepanation_

e-mail: paul at csgrad.cs.vt.edu                    A stranger in a strange land.