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Sony 900ES SACD sound vs CD - Help

I now have a little over 120 hours on my 9000ES DVD. Here's the problem: When I use the Sony as a transport (The digital output fed into an MSB Link Dac 2) the sound quality is MUCH better than the Sony supplied SACD music played through the SACD internal decoding circuits and output form the analog outputs on the Sony.

How can this be? I thought the SACD was supposed to be much better than the CD. Is it possible that the SACD circuits need much more time to break in?

The Sony when used as a transport is almost as good as my SimAudio Moon Eclipse cd player (when also used as a transport) which has a floating suspension.

I have the Sony on a magnetic levitation system which I designed that floats it 1/4 to 1/2" off the shelf.
This isolates the transport and circuitry from low frequency vibration. The result is: better bass, more open midrange, and clearer highs.

I just don't understand why the SACD part of this doesn't sound as good as everyone says it does. Maybe the sampler sacd is very good?

Any ideas??
128x128darrell
rcprince
3,073 posts
 
The Sony sampler, overall, is not that great for showing what SACD can do. If you like their music, try to get the dmp sampler, which has all DSD recordings instead of older analog masters from CBS/Columbia. In addition, check out the must-have SACDs thread here as well. And, as Joekras points out, let it break in--the posts I've seen say you have to break in both the CD and SACD sides separately. When you use the digital out, I don't think any signal runs through the analog stage, and you are only using the CD laser, so you're not breaking the unit in for SACDs. Ultimately, I still felt that the analog section was too polite and unexciting for my taste and compared to what I am used to, and had a mod done to bypass it, but obviously there are a lot of owners of the Sony SACD players who like the stock version as is, so give it some more time. Good luck!
jadem6's avatar
jadem6
1,074 posts
 
If you only have 120 hours of burn in your only 1/4 of the way. YOU MUST BURN BOTH LASERS FOR 200+ HOURS. This requires 200 with regular cds and another 200 hours with SACD. Just put a SACD or CD into the unit and put it on replay, you do not have to have it go through your other components. Happy burning, and be patient it's worth it.
mikeam
122 posts
 
I agree with everyone else that it has to burn in, but... I noticed right away that SACD was far better than CD. The comparison was made to CD's being played on the Meitner Super Bidat being fed by various high end transports. You shelf sounds way cool, but I wonder if you have taken into account the shielding of the magnetic flux field. I would aussume this is a fairly strong field if it can hold the weight of your player which I think tips the scal at 20+ lbs. I am guessing that the player was on the shelf being levitated and the dac was on another shelf? If so you may want to try the unit as a player away from the mag field.
Regards,
Mike
themusicshop
41 posts
 
I just got my 777 SACD player yesterday and yes it still needs alot of burn in time. A good way to burn in any of these units is to place a 10K ohm resistor across the analog outputs via cheap RCA plug, press repeat and let it go. Yes the analog outputs are active even when you have the unit in standard CD mode and have the digital output active. I would have to agree with the others, these units will need break in on SACD and CD both. AS for you magnetic shelf, I would also wonder if it is having some effect.
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ivanj
35 posts
 
Has anyone compared the 333ES vs the 9000ES vs the earlier generation on sound quality with SACDs only? I'm not interested in multifunction just good sound for the $.
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