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Why aren't all CD players also DAC's?

Several years ago I had a California Audio Labs Tercet that was a one-box CD player but to use it as a CD player you installed the small RCA jumper from the coax "audio digital out" to the coax "audio digital in". In other words, the transport and the DAC parts of the machine were separated, so you could use it as either a DAC, transport, or regular CD player. That was prior to when the computer audio thing got big.

So my question is, with everyone nowadays having digital music on their computers and needing a DAC to play it through, why do manufacturers still make single-box CD players with no options for digital inputs? How much extra cost could it possibly add to allow that feature? That would certainly make the unit much more versatile.

Or am I just missing something?

Michael
sufentanil
ghostrider45
449 posts
 
I can think of two reasons. First is cost for extra jacks and associated real estate on the chassis. There is also a downside in that the cable used to connect the transport section to the DAC section becomes a huge issue (check out threads here on digital cables).

The second reason is that an internal connection avoids the SPDIF conversion and associated clock recovery issues. With a direct on the board connection it's easy to keep separate clock and audio streams for reduced jitter (think I squared S).
blindjim
3,092 posts
 

CDPs are DACs. They're simply quite proprietary, decoding only those discs placed within them in predetermined formats, and not for outboard use... generally speaking.
ejlif's avatar
ejlif
1,377 posts
 
I think they should too.
rcprince
3,085 posts
 
Quite a few CDPs these days have digital inputs so that you can use the DAC portion of the player separately. Wadia had made this available for quite a while; looking quickly at a couple of websites, I see that Cambridge Audio has it on their top of the line 840 Azur, and the inexpensive Oppo has USB inputs. So I think manufacturers are getting the message.
face
516 posts
 
Add the Marantz SA-15S2 and also most of Ayon's new line to a list of players with a digital input.
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