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State of the art CD player? Only if you do this.

Im getting irratated with CD player manufacturers saying every year we have eclipsed last years model, with what ever. upsampling, hi rez dacs, smoother, quieter transport, better parts wiring etc!!!! If you want to get the best fidelity (no im not saying vinyl. caught ya didnt I)If you want the best sound possible, best playback. The absolute best then just buy the digital recorder the music was originally recorded on !. The copy can only be as good as the mother right? How much are these digital recorders in major studios? If they are $5000 or $10,000, then how can someone be justified for spending 20,000 on a hi end brand player for CD playback? For analog it would take the master tape with the machine it was recorded on. Totally not feasable. But for digital? How can a consumer player sound better than the original recorder it was recorded on?? It cant!!! Ok maybe these pro models are several hundred thousand dollars. Then I'll admit you got me and I was wrong. The point of this is I want to know how much these pro models cost?? A quick search on google did not turn up anything over $3800! Im not well versed in digital. Are digital masters on tape, CD or hard drive? If its on digital tape well I'll understand. Mike
128x128blueranger
hotmailjbc
571 posts
 
i read an article where an audiophile who has reviewed thousands of cds wrote that 1 percent were recorded well and correctly. i bet everyone on this forum will agree that a certain special cd will evoke a wow reaction and most are just ok to pretty good. on the better/more expensive cd players is it worth it to just get ok cd performance? i have many cds that sound marginal but i love the music anyway. so i just improved the dac and isolated the transport and thats the way i look at it.
onhwy61's avatar
onhwy61
5,218 posts
 
Modern studios don't record in the CD format. Typically they record at higher sample and bit rates than 44.1kHz/16bit. Studios also don't typically use a stand alone recorder. The recording is more than likely recorded using a computer hard drive system with dedicated recording software. As a consumer you could get the same computer hard drive system and software that the studios use, more than likely ProTools, but you would then have to gain access to the high sample/bit rate files the studio used in order to exceed CD quality sound. Not a likely scenario.
rrog
1,958 posts
 
You're kidding, right? I guess you haven't figured out high end audio yet. I have a better question for you. Why does a power cord cost $16,000 when the recording was made with a $20 power cord?
nevillekapadia
95 posts
 
Redbook CD is limited as a source to hold sufficient data as compared to other analog mediums such as RTR and vinyl. So stop chasing the holy grail from this medium. It's just that it was chosen to be convenient and at a time suitable for commercialization and acceptance by the general public (no one came and asked an audiophile if they would like CD).
paperw8
165 posts
 

12-03-10: Nevillekapadia
Redbook CD is limited as a source to hold sufficient data as compared to other analog mediums such as RTR and vinyl.

they typically frequency-limit recordings on vinyl as well (i think typically to 14kHz or 16kHz); but i think that cd's sound pretty good. in fact, i think that you get more bang for your buck with cd than you can with vinyl. $2000 will get you a pretty good sounding cd player, but by the time you bought a turntable, tonearm, cartridge and phono stage, you would probably be looking at a lot more money.

but vinyl does give you more opportunity to shape (or color) the sound to your liking. on the other hand, the myriad adjustments can be a pain in the neck. for example, some people do vta adjustments for each record. with cd's you just pop the disk in. some cd players do allow variable selection of digital signal processing algorithms to color the sound to your liking, but you still get nowhere near as much latitude as you get with a vinyl playback setup.
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