The knowledge for redbook CD playback is so deep in depth and requires a lot of knowhow to deal with the "invisible/intengible" aspects in the set up causing die-hard analogue people like me that always face problem and cannot get the soul of the music out of it.
I think the money and the efforts I paid for learning a good digital playback is so much more than learning and comparing cartridges, tonearms, tables, phonostages and time for tweaking a Lp playback was just basically a mechanical setting routine.
There is obvious setback in the sound I get for digital playback in the past as compared to analog, which can never be more than just limited to all these findings -- smaller sound staging, lack of 3D and layering of the sound stage, harmonics and trailing edge of strings toward the last few bits seem always be truncated, human vocal, the intensity level of the mid Hi in relation to mid bass and low bass extension is always in trouble when the volume knob is cranked up. When you go from 16bits, 44.1kHz upsampling to 24bits, 192kHz, the mid bass and low bass extension is too much smoothened up, the whole sound stage at the higher mid and hi, though, opened up but the whole sound stage becomes recess. Overall, the mid is badly affected and cannot never be tolerated by someone like me who love and indulge so much time in analog playback. Besides behaving like the rest of the hardworking audiophiles who put a lot of money into power cords, digital interconnects, power conditioners, Quantums, mechincal isolating devices etc., I learnt the differences in digital out to DAC versus audio out from CD player to ADD/upsampler and to DAC. To cut short the whole story, I managed to get the sound of redbook CD playback to the level I love and I can enjoy. Thanks.
I think the money and the efforts I paid for learning a good digital playback is so much more than learning and comparing cartridges, tonearms, tables, phonostages and time for tweaking a Lp playback was just basically a mechanical setting routine.
There is obvious setback in the sound I get for digital playback in the past as compared to analog, which can never be more than just limited to all these findings -- smaller sound staging, lack of 3D and layering of the sound stage, harmonics and trailing edge of strings toward the last few bits seem always be truncated, human vocal, the intensity level of the mid Hi in relation to mid bass and low bass extension is always in trouble when the volume knob is cranked up. When you go from 16bits, 44.1kHz upsampling to 24bits, 192kHz, the mid bass and low bass extension is too much smoothened up, the whole sound stage at the higher mid and hi, though, opened up but the whole sound stage becomes recess. Overall, the mid is badly affected and cannot never be tolerated by someone like me who love and indulge so much time in analog playback. Besides behaving like the rest of the hardworking audiophiles who put a lot of money into power cords, digital interconnects, power conditioners, Quantums, mechincal isolating devices etc., I learnt the differences in digital out to DAC versus audio out from CD player to ADD/upsampler and to DAC. To cut short the whole story, I managed to get the sound of redbook CD playback to the level I love and I can enjoy. Thanks.