We have an old Sony ES CD player 35+ years that is still kicking. A Rotel amp kept blowing fuses gone and one other CD player laser died. The ES still sounds quite good and have it hooked to Nakamichi Receiver 2. The Nakamichi is from my Dad who passed at 94. He originally had Macintosh mono equipment that he purchased in about 1957 to 1959. He did not do a great job on speakers but the Nak is superb. Only problem is the FM inpuit is not coax had to use a flat wire old tv 50 ohm converter and the wires are weak.
Old digital that still kicks butt
Not being a believer that time necessarily = progress, I would like to offer the following example of a sonic gem that has transcended time and can totally kick butt in a modern milieu:
1. Marantz CD5000 al la CD48, Philips Cd753, CDS751: what do these players all have in common:? the miraculous TDA1549 chip. As Lucas Ficas alias ’Lampizator‘ has described this chip is a killer and probably the best Philips has produced. If you take the output straight from the chip via high quality output caps the sound quality is still right up there. Add a cathode follower if you you wish for greater solidity and slam at the expense of ultimate clarity.
Add some chassis damping and you have something that plays real music.
1. Marantz CD5000 al la CD48, Philips Cd753, CDS751: what do these players all have in common:? the miraculous TDA1549 chip. As Lucas Ficas alias ’Lampizator‘ has described this chip is a killer and probably the best Philips has produced. If you take the output straight from the chip via high quality output caps the sound quality is still right up there. Add a cathode follower if you you wish for greater solidity and slam at the expense of ultimate clarity.
Add some chassis damping and you have something that plays real music.
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I've got a Sony 703ES circa 1985. It's sound quality is worthy of a unit from that era: http://www.thevintageknob.org/sony-DAS-703ES.html
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I have a Naim nDAC powered by a Pardo T-XPS; it's seen off (almost) everything I've compared it to - Denafrips, Schiit's Yggy, Hugo TT, etc. The one DAC that was noticeably better was the dCS Rossini; while I' sure there are others I've never heard one that's noticeably/obviously better for anything close to what I paid for the nDAC and Pardo power supply - about $2.2k USD. And while I don't own one, I heard a Theta Digital DSPre Gen 3 that is still terrific. Ditto an older Wadia. |
I agree the good old R2R ladder dacs sound more musical than any of the one bit or bitstream dacs I’ve heard. But it also depends on the implementation. I’ve had two players with 2x PCM 1704k (Krell KAV 300cd and Bow ZZ-8) that both sounded very nice (still own the Bow for its striking industrial design). But they were no match for the Krell KPS20i from 1995, which had 4x PCM 64k (one generation older R2R) in fully balanced digital mode. Over the years this machine has survived many newcomers from respectable brands (Metronome, Esoteric), so for me this is ’old digital that still kicks butt’. Even literally, as the bass slam of this thing has never been surpassed in my experience. I recently had it fully refurbished with a motor and servo revision, new laser, new clock, new caps, etc. I just hope it will run forever. |
My modern, not vintage Naim ND555 music server uses the 1704 chip in an R2R ladder DA C. It sounds pretty good. I have no idea if this particular approach is the reason for it sounding good. My old CD player, also a Naim CDP555 also had a ladder DAC employing that same chip. Does that make me a fanboy? |
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