Who listens primarily to Redbook CD?

I listen mostly to jazz and have over 1500 CDs and have until recently only listened to them through my Red Wine battery powered CD transport (into a Metrum NOS DAC). Ripping and serving from HD or SSD makes sense to me, from a downsizing perspective as well as the error correction you get from the rip (and some of my CDs are pretty old and well used so I'm sure that helps). So I have been experimenting with HQplayer on my laptop as a cheap first step in analyzing HD streaming over USB vs cd transport over BNC as the source. This setup allows me to try upsampling as well. First impressions: even without tricking out the source with USB reclockers, linear power supplies, etc I am getting excellent sound so it bodes well for moving to a dedicated music server. One surprise, I don't hear much if any benefit from upsampling though I have a lot more playing to do in that area. It's what makes this hobby so much fun!

One can't help wondering if copying an audio cassette would also result in a copy that sounded better than the original. Or is that just too crazy?

@tommylion thanks for the phtotos I always love looking in AN gear. So my AN Dac-3 Signature predates their use of that AMD chip and uses the PCM63K chip which is a multibit chip. For that reason, and the overall AN overbuilt power supply and robust design I feel my unit sounds fantastic. Cheers!

One can’t help wondering if copying an audio cassette would also result in a copy that sounded better than the original. Or is that just too crazy?

It is possible that some people might think it does. It has to do with the given individual genetic pre-disposition of "Ear-Q" (hearing intelligence) in the individual’s neurological aspects, and how they learned to hear (how they ended up wiring themselves as they grew-over time) and how they used this feedback loop to wire up and chose a given audio system. Learning speed also plays as part of the IQ and E-Q package in as it changes the size and scope of the field of analysis, and in time, or work done over time, so the final position maybe quite far down the road and encompass much, or ...not.

Since it is connected to their unconscious aspects and flows through the place their reproductive impetus is located, it can get into an intractable and unstoppable force the size of their own life force..when it comes to protecting that given ’position’ on audio. They have to project it and have the world echo-mirror it back, part of the ego awareness loop that passes through the conscious-unconcious barrier.

Which is how you get to intractable positions which are forced upon others --as if said positions are every one else’s reality. Complex sociological aspects are also at play.

And so on.

There’s much more to say but one cannot wire a 50 page explanation for each post, so it can be better received. To err in the smaller post on the side of ease, not pressure and force.

My point is that most people in this thread are saying that Delta-sigma is a fail when it comes to representing the best that digital can do.

The math and the measurements and the science of it can take a walk... if it fails to meet what people think of as representing music. One person proclaiming strongly that it does meet such....does not change that.

What we hear is what we hear and measurement in engineering terms is not what the ear hears or how the ear works. Engineering weighting of error vs signal does not work in the same way the ear does. This is the critical break point in situations that put too much emphasis on science in electrical engineering, and fail to properly work out what the ear does and expects in signal. The ear is not a ’finished’ science. That area of endeavor, physically and neurologically.. is not complete, or as measurable as the electrical engineering.

The problem is almost equivalent to the one where the drunk looks for his keys under the light, even though he lost his keys somewhere else, in the dark. As he can’t see in the dark. Which we recognize as near pointless. One has to go into the dark, as that is where the question and the answer is.

These flame wars are as usual, the people who use their ears.... and... the people who push about science and electrical function.

And few on the electrical side of the argument realize they don't have a complete question and answer set. And they push almost blindly. They tend to weaponize the science and engineering and use it as a stick and firebrand to attack those who use their ears and aren't deeply versed in the science end of the pool. It is, in it's extreme cases... in a word, incorrect or incomplete, as positions go.

Until about a 18 months ago, CD was my preferred format. It no longer is for numerous reasons including cost (why burn to cd or buy a cd when the digital file can be played directly), longevity of the data storage on that media (data fails in far less than the purported "100 years" when the format was originally introduced) and bit/sample limitation (why listen to 16/44 when 24/192 is available).

The aforementioned said, I still love my Emotiva ERC-3. For a relatively inexpensive piece of audio gear, it certainly can provide a lot of enjoyment when playing back a redbook cd. While I would think this is a delta sigma dac and not r2r (given the posts herein about cost and availability of r2r, but I honestly don't know), it truly does produce outstanding sound and is probably among the most underrated players on the market.