CD or Streaming... am I missing out?


I listen to CD in my headphone office system. Use a Theta Compli transport and a very nice and pricey tube 16/44 DAC. Have thought about a streaming capability and all its benefits but am both limited by SPDF and by 16/44 only. I also love the analog sound of my tube DAC. Does streaming sound far surpass CD? Am I missing out?
mglik

Showing 1 response by bezmania

So here's the weird thing... This thread got me comparing stuff. I run Qobuz hi-res through a Cambridge Audio Azure851N streamer/DAC. Today, I hooked up an old, but good CD player (Linn Classik CD, integrated CD/tuner/amp). Not a really upper-upper-high-end device, but not garbage either. I use it as redbook player only, feed SPDIF into the same streamer/DAC. 

Now for the weird bit: the CD player sounds substantially better than the Qobuz FLAC at the same sample rate. Beter soundstage, better definition. How? Why? If i assume that Qobuz doesn't f*ck up the ripping proces, why is there such a difference?

</puzzling>