Why CD players will never be dead

I'll wait for on demand streaming downloads to mature into a viable option. No way, never in my lifetime will I rip 1000's of cds onto a hard drive. Till then I will continue to enjoy rotating cd players of different sonic merits. Modifying each to my satisfaction.

Mr. Tennis - The problem with comparing my USB DAC with your CD player is that everything is different, the interface and the DAC. My DAC even has a volume control, so it would replace your preamp. It's not fair really. It will make your CD player sound like a boombox. This is an award-winning front-end that got best of show from TAS for the last 2 years at RMAF.

A more fair comparison to see how computer audio compares to optical disc would be to compare your CD player as a transport to my USB converter as a transport, both driving the same good DAC with the same S/PDIF cable.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

Reb - Here is what I think of on-line streaming music: It will probably be a rent as you go basis, just like streaming movies. It will also be limited in bandwith by using compressed lossy formats, so the quality will suffer. I dont want to pay each time I listen to a music track, particularly if it's not master tape quality.

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

To Steve (Audioengr) or anyone else inclined to explain...How is it possible for a copy of a CD played from a computer hard drive to sound better than the original CD? I'm not trying to be argumentative. I would really like to understand what the improvement derives from. Is it the "ripping" (copying?) process that unlocks more info from the original CD? or is it the bit stream being read off the hard drive that is some how superior to what a conventional (or even mod'd.) CD player can produce? Is it the result of something else? I don't get it.

Ghosthouse:

I'm taking a stab at this so bear with me until someone more knowledgable chimes in. I think it is a combination and quality of things that bear on the playback.

I've heard my DACmini out of a top of the line Ayon CDP and it was a bit better than the Ayon by itself.

I tried it out of my TEAC PD-H600 and it, too was better than the TEAC by itself, by a wider margin.

The DACmini out of my iMac with Bitperfect (CAN'T forget the add ons) sounded similar, but better, than with the Ayon and much, much better than with the TEAC.

This all leads me to believe that the transport is the culprit. Every time that CDP spins and reads, its never the same. It can't be replicated equally, every time. But with an iMac (or PC based) hard drive or SSD, its the same read every time. All of that without the spinning platter and laser read of the disk.

I remember reading a review over at 6moons.com about how the reading of a disk and transfer to the DAC, in a CDP, is still an analog (mechanical) function or something to that effect. Its not really digital until the conversion. With a computer, or computer based server, its digital (not mechanical) through and through. I hope I've remembered it correctly and I hope this helps until someone with better skills and background can explain.

All the best,
Nonoise