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Loss of inner detail

Greetings,
I've owned a Sony SCD-XA5400ES for 2 years now and really do love it. In my system it has out performed these CDPs:
Electrocompanient EMC-1UP
Linn Ikemi
Meridian 508.24
Accuphase DP-57
Resolution Audio Opus 21
Ayre CX-7e
Bel Canto CD-1

I got the OK from my wife to buy a "final" Transport - DAC (ie: spend a larger dollar amount, ha) that will give me the flexibility of having digital input for the possibility of adding a server at one point.

As I live in Minneapolis I thought I'd try the Bel Canto CD-2 and DAC 3 combo (used). Well, I got a good deal on a used DAC 3 and ran my Sony into the DAC using RCA spdif from the Sony into the DAC3. (I'm waiting to buy a used CD2, but they don't come up often)
ALL inner detail of songs has disappeared (I'm exaggerating a bit, but the difference is quite stark!). Music sounds FAR superior just using the Sony. Why is this?

I'm using a Black Cat Veloce digital cable.

Rest of my system:

Gamut CD-2r preamp
TAD-60 amp
Spendor S9 speakers
Analysis Plus interconnects and speaker cables

Please offer your thoughts as this is my first foray into a separate Transport & DAC

Thanks!
tgyeti
nonoise's avatar
nonoise
11,202 posts
 
If I were to hazard a guess it would either be the transport or the cable. I know what you mean by loss of detail having experienced it firsthand. What was there is now diminished or simply gone. That would have me scratching my head as well.
Time to experiment.
kbuss
9 posts
 
I would be questioning the amount of jitter the Sony is putting out, or a mismatch in performance between the clocks in transport vs dac. If anything, the Veloce's performance (very high) would accentuate any problems elsewhere. I can assure you the issue is not the Black Cat Veloce.
tmsorosk
1,013 posts
 
Since your using two matching components I would suspect the interconnect. No matter what others here assure you of, unless they have hear that cable in your system there only guessing. Digital cables can be very finicky from one system to the next. See if you can borrow other digital cables from friends or a dealer. Have you considered the possibility that one of your components is faulty?
tgyeti OP
84 posts
 
@ Tmsorosk: Perhaps you misread my original post. The transport & DAC are not matching components.
I suppose it's possible one of the components is faulty, but I find that less of a possibility then just the fact that the Sony (as a transport)and the Bel Canto DAC are probably not suited to work well together.

To all others: Thanks for the advise offered, no need to continue this thread IMO.
audioengr
3,282 posts
 
Tgyeti - there is no such thing as "synergy" with digital interfaces and cables. Either they are designed well or they are not. Mixing and matching is fine, and usually beneficial because the designer of a DAC is not necessarily good at doing transport.

This concept of synergy is taken way overboard. It usually only applies to amps and speakers, and there are technical reasons for this.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio
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