AMR / EMM / PLAYBACK Designs

Jason,
If you read my review of the Playback Designs at www.Dagogo.com you will have noted that I sold my existing Esoteric X01-D2 after many years of enjoyment and am currently borrowing a CDSA from a good friend. This has given me a golden opportunity to understand what each unit does well and how they differ. I find the CDSA to be an exceptional unit with many strengths, particularly used with the Halcyonics isolation base. I will, however, be very surprised if the XDS1 is not in a different class.

Hi Fred
Thanks for the link, yes I am sure the EMM Labs XDS1 is another level above the EMM Labs CDSA in playback.

What I wanted to say is that I am still very impressed with CDSA especially at its price point, it gives me a digital playback reference point to use with my Fat Boy horns that is very close to what I hear at open air live concerts.

On Friday night we were playing the band Katchafire`s Live album who I have seen many times live, the Vocal and instruments sounded very real in my listening room and how I remember them standing beside the mixing desk at the concert.
WWW.KATCHAFIRE.CO.NZ
Thanks Jason.

Just out of Interest and a bit of New Zealand music promotion Katchafire is touring the US now I have noticed from their Gig Guide.

Gig guide link
http://www.katchafire.co.nz/gig-guide

Great NZ Roots Reggae band with Bob Marley Style lead vocals.
Cheers Jason.

The XDS1 arrived yesterday while I was at work and will see some heavy playing this weekend. Initial thoughts will follow the weekend.

The XDS1 has been in contitnuous play since Friday morning but will still require many additional hours of breakin. Given the new rather brute force power supply, you might think that power cords would make little difference. You would be incorrect in that assumption. It is quite sensitive. It seems to simply love the Jorma Prime power cords which incorporate Jack Bybee's filter modules and the Weizhi power distribution system. Properly set up the XDS1 significantly outperforms any of the other digital equipment which I have had in my home including the CDSA. This superiority is particularly evident in the top octaves which are extended and completely devoid of any digital artifacts. I have always appreciated the difference between red book and SACD and other digital formats but not completely understood how wide the gap actually was with DSD. The XDS1 makes it abundantly clear how good the best SACD's can be and their superiority over red book. It also provides the best red book playback that I have heard. More later.