In my experience differences in sound quality between CD, stored files, and streaming is entirely contingent on your component choices. I have extensive experience since I bought one of the first high end CD player that was released shortly after the CD was released. I constantly tried new technologies as the became available… stored files on drives, solid state drives, network attachable storage, and different streaming configurations.
I am currently giving away all my CDs and relying exclusively on Aurender streamers. Best sound ever.
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I to am a vinyl freak if you are like me you have invested the price of a nice car in you rig. If this is true IMO 4000 is not going to top your current playback. I have heard several digital streaming rigs that competes the MP 2000 R MKII has a CD also but it will set you back 10K after taxes. The others are way more expensive.
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Two posts that I found informative, on this, neverending subject:
Mikelavigne wrote:
at the entry level it’s a horse apiece.....computers are servers. servers are computers. maybe a dedicated server has slightly less noise, and maybe a better power cord than a sever; but likely your network bandwidth, network switch, ethernet and usb cables will have a greater effect than other choices at this level.
2--mid level dedicated servers will outperform regular computers and laptops since they eliminate much of the peripheral noisy processing duties of the normal computers. there is a clear difference to go dedicated.
3--price no object server levels they far outperform any computer or laptop. but you are talking $20k to $100k for a music server. i own a $76k music server and it is awesome sounding and significantly outperforms my previous $30k+ music server. once i heard the difference i could not 'unhear' it. and took the plunge.
Post from owner and constructor of Mojo Audio
Benjamin from Mojo Audio here.
I just wanted to let you all know that my current reference digital source is a modified Jay’s Audio CD transport.
The time, tune, and harmonic coherency is like nothing I’ve ever heard. And I’ve owned some pretty exotic CD transports
Don’t ask me to explain why, but the best computer audio won’t hold a candle to a proper CD transport. Even those new JCAT XE OCXO clocked USB cards, which has the same type of OCXO clock as the Jay’s CD transport, is not even close.
When I played this for some local audiophiles all their jaws dropped. The sound was so much better than any digital music they ever heard no one ever asked to go back to computer audio for a comparison.
I now consider the best computer audio as background music. The timing and tune are totally messed up. Streaming is worse, but even music played from your music library on an internal SSD is off time and tune.
Seriously. Once you hear it you can’t unhear it. The sound those of you who are real music lovers have been waiting for.
I removed all computers from my main system. If I’m going to warm up my tube amp, I’m going to change CDs from now on.'
So, the answer is 'it depends', (could it be any other) of the level of gear you will use and money that you (or anyone) is ready to invest to 'beat' one or another 'type' of reproduction.
In the same time, the quality of recordings that are streamed is often dubious or unknown and than, the physical media is perhaps the better solution...
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I like to have the ability to play all the different formats that I can. To me, that’s the fun of the hobby. Why limit yourself. Certain recordings sound different in different formats, that’s the fun of exploring different platforms. If your finances allow, make the most of it. If you are happy with only one certain medium, then more power to you!
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I spin Cds, just purchased a Neodio Origine S2 cd player , a fair amount of money but the music sounds sublime; draws me further to and into the music. To my ears the music is presented with more natural tone, texture and timber; there's more body to the sound; the sound-stage is more refined; the frequency extremes are well balanced; and there's no digital edginess.
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@facten for $25K new it better! Better give you an eargasim.
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@secretguy ”Streaming is virtual theft.”
Artists indeed receive a mere pittance from streaming engagement (a fraction a cent per play). According to the RIAA, CD and vinyl combined sales accounted for about 11% of revenue in 2021.
My guess is that the people that go and dish out the $15 at the record store (or order online) for the fresh new CD release are few and far between these days.
When we are constantly buying used vinyl and CDs at stores, yard sales, record swaps, and from third party sellers, we’re not putting a single cent in the pockets of artists.
To the folks who purchase music, as a matter of course, in a way that directly compensates the artists at a rate greater than $0.004 per song, more power to ya.
The problem as I see it is the new CD at the store will offer, for the vast majority of listeners, little-if-any increase in sound quality, but plenty of extra price and inconvenience compared to it’s streaming/iTunes/whatever counterpart. I don’t see a lot of benefit to the buyer here aside from peripheral benefits (physical handling, better artwork, collectible pleasures, a sense of moral edification, etc.). Sure, folks fortunate enough to have high end music playback gear may be able to discern the improvement in sound from a streamed song to its CD counterpart, but, again, these folks are few are far between.
At the end of the day, how much further from “thievery” is a person who’s always buying used vinyl, used CDs, scouring Discogs, Ebay, Amazon, etc. than the person who streams all the time?
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I have lived without a transport for a few years now. All my CD's are ripped to FLAC and streamed right alongside Qobuz.
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@facten
”Neodio Origine S2 cd player” This CD player/dac sounds so beautiful. Congrats on your purchase of this player. I have heard it and it certainly is very, very special. Wow! Anyone on this thread, regardless of format opinion, would be floored with the breath taking sound of this unit playing redbook CDs.
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Another consideration. Many new innovations with streaming equipment, highly likely it will only improve over time. Should we expect cd transports are going to evolve in similar fashion?
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@grannyring - Thank you. Guessing that you should be close to receiving your Tron Atlantic Signature DAC. I auditioned the GT version while at Gestalt Audio and very much understand why you wrote up the review you did of it; it is thoroughly engaging.
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I'd forget about buying a transport.
I keep my digital library (> 4000 CDs) on a network drive, ripped in FLAC on my computer and we have A/B tested CD play vs network several times without finding any preference. I keep a player in my main system because I have it, but use it very rarely to audition the odd CD to see if I want to add it to the library.
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I agree with above. For some of you, you may wish to go the Audiogon forum and look up the Project RS2T blog, very lengthy and informative. It discusses that referenced transport, and add your own DAC ( a good one, subjective of course) and your CD collection will literary amaze you. I own a audiolab transport 6000, a very good machine, However, by replacing it with the Project model, you will hear CD's like you have never heard them before. At that point you can now compare streaming services. I stream qobuz R&R loudly and believe me you may more often than not choose your CD over the Stream. I enjoy both.... On a good system with that transport and associated DAC, you won't believe your ears. Talk to anyone that owns one! Robert TN Ps. read some of Charles dad1 posts on the topic, as he owns one also. Audiogon Project RS2T blog A very interesting read
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This has been a great conversation. I looked at my digital world and realized that it is mostly in boxes on 20+ hard drives..none of it audio. My whole digital life, my family, business ..now retired .. is all in boxes on random hard drives. So, I decided to consolidate, wipe all drives and dispose or sell them.
I just purchased a five bay Synology DS1522+/Four 16TB enterprise drives.. can add more later.. 32GB of Ram and 800GB of M.2 NVMe SSD cache. My external CD/DVD drive comes today and I will store all music on the NAS, as well as centralize 50,000+ Lightroom photos + years of family videos. So, I spent my CD transport money on a NAS.. rather a different outcome than I saw coming into this conversation. What I give up is being able to listen to a limited number SACD discs and what I will need to do is maximize my streamer. It is clear to me that with enough money, I could buy a CD transport that will outshine present day streaming, but I don’t believe that this difference will remain and streaming equipment will get better with time. Retirement involves projects, hobbies..a bit of travel and like always..obeying the almighty spouse.. The NAS is a project/hobby. Well, gotta go.. some power cables just arrived...Thanks for all the input...Gary
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@vonhelmholtz
Your decision sounds reasonable. Certainly getting rid of the big pile of disk drives. I have been in IT most of my career… so I have about 50tb in storage… not including a bunch of source disks laying around. 1) my primary PC (14TB), 2) NAS 14TB… and 3) backup Drobo (16tb) (USB connect). I try to maintain 2 backups.
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@vonhelmholtz You laid out the reasons, wise choice in my estimation.
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facten
You are very fortunate to own a Neodio Origine S2 Player. Very sweet.
Which CD player did you own previously?
Happy Listening!
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Why?
This is a very profound question.
Let me have a stab:
to play cds, sacds...?
no?
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@jafant - In my main system my previous sources were a Mojo Audio EVO DAC and Simaudio 260D CD Transport. I enjoyed listening with them and have moved them into my 2nd system. I don’t stream but if I decide to and want to use my main system the Neodio also has SPDIF and USB digital inputs for that purpose.
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Nice second system digital front end! @facten I would love to hear your system someday. Your Daedalus Argos V2s are also most interesting. The Neodio sounded wonderful streaming, but CDs played through this unit were extraordinary.
Some of the very best digital I have ever heard.
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As always, the forum community is like the "Eye of Sauron" or if there was such a thing, the "Ear of Sauron": omniscient and never wrong in their opinions. Some comments are helpful and kind but it can be interesting. Discussions re. vinyl v. CD v. streaming are endless. Some obvious points re. CDs, less prone to damage, more affordable (than vinyl), easier to store if that's important, essentially zero surface noise, the bit rate and gapless playback are great. And if you want, you can rip to a hard drive/NAS and then "stream".
Can we agree, vinyl, streaming, and CDs each have pros and cons? Beyond endless debate, what do you enjoy? I oft repeat Hans Beekhuyzen when he concludes his YouTube posts, and whatever you do... enjoy the music.
Streaming. I use TIDAL primarily 75% of my listening time, and 5% or so Spotify. (I tried Qobuz and Amazon HD but preferred TIDAL.) Can we acknowledge that streaming services have pros and cons? What matters is which one(s) do you like and enjoy?
Short Answer, I love my CD player and the resulting sound.
Long Answer, I have a large CD collection. Not all are available via streaming. After almost 1 year of research, I bought the QUAD Artera Play+ for about $2000. In that price range, you'll find about 3-4 comparable brands. (If you are interested, search reviews. Most are are high.) I have a McIntosh amp, Revel F328Be speakers, et. al. components. I use XLR connections (another debated point) from the QUAD and my DAC to the McIntosh (early on I decide for all XLR balanced connections on my equipment. My room, while not perfect, is well treated with diffusers and many panels, etc.)
When I "A-B" CDs with a variety of streaming tracks (including the hotly debated "love it or hate it" MQA and other files), generally the CD sounds better. I have a few audiophile friends who are far more knowledgeable than me and they agree, the CD often sounds better, sometimes significantly. John Darko has several interesting YouTube posts on CDs that would be worth your time.
Many great CD transports/players are available. The QUAD's UI is a bit clunky but feature rich, including the ability to program tracks you may not want to hear on a particular CD. (I find this feature wonderful with film score/soundtracks when there's an occasional track that's not a piece of music I enjoy. Additionally, and I may be labeled a heretic, but in some classical pieces, the length, repetition, or sometimes bombastic and high tension pieces get on my nerves, you can tell the player once and it remembers to skip those tracks. Not the reason to buy the unit obviously, but a nice feature. The DAC in the QUAD is imo amazing. I was more than amazed at the QUAD's performance. It's built like a truck. I literally cannot hear the CD disc spinning once in the player. That's impressive.
Last, and very surprisingly, when I can't figure out a feature or function on the QUAD their customer service actually responds quickly via email!
I hope you find a solution that's great for you!
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The best reason to purchase a CD player/transport is, there are 6 trillion CD in the world.
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Novel idea, have both cd transport AND streaming setup, one doesn't have to preclude the other.
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facten
Thank You for the follow up to my query. Is Neodio represented here in the U.S. ?
Foreign distributor?
Happy Listening!
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@jafant - yes as grannyring noted , I purchased it from Gestalt Audio in Nashville TN. +1 regarding his comments about Colin
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@grannyring - Bill you are welcome to take the drive down I 40W anytime
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Well, I ripped all of my CDs in two days. The fact that it took so little time is another red flag...meaning that I don't own many CDs. Holo Dac DTE, Timber Nation Tiger Maple equipment rack and NAS should be here by 9/7..so we will see..
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grannyring
Thank You for the follow up. Actually, I work in Nashville. I will contact Colin.
Happy Listening!
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grannyring
Do you live in the greater Nashville area?
Happy Listening!
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facten
Thank you for the follow up. I will contact Colin. Great to see that Neodio is represented here in America. Do you live in the greater Nashville area?
Happy Listening!
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@jafant
Yes, I live 19 miles south of Nashville in Franklin, TN.
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grannyring
Wonderful! Nice area. Does Nashville have an Audio Club?
Besides Gestalt Audio, another other Audio shop(s) worth checking out?
Happy Listening!
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I don’t think an audio club exists, but I may be wrong? I have not heard of one.
Two other high end audio shops in Nashville now. Hifi Buys is one. They sell the well known brands such as Focal and McIntosh. Atelier Audio 13 is small, but Constantine has some interesting lines. He is by appointment only and operates out of his home with a room of gear. I have not been in his home /room.
Colin of Gestalt Audio Design is rather special based on my experience with dealers over the years. Here are the reasons I think this way:
- He possesses great listening skills and has actually helped me improve my listening skills. He has raised the level of music enjoyment and emotional connection to it for me and my wife in our home Hifi system.
- He imports and represents manufactures that share his love for purity of tone and sonic realism in the pieces they build. All the gear he sells sounds so magnificent. Yes, some of it is just out of my budget, but many other pieces are more approachable financially.
- He is honest, passionate about music playback, most likable and a calm mannered gentleman. He is just so easy to work with.
I have now purchased my Circle Labs integrated, Tron dac plus Hijiri and Tchernov cables from him. I hope to soon be buying speakers from Colin.
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Nashville HiFi appears to be closing down.
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@jafant - I live in a suburb just outside of Memphis.
Aside from the Neodio I have also purchased 3 sets of Tchernov cables from Gestalt.
I have made a few purchases from Atlelier 13 , an Aqua Dac that I no longer have, Takek supertweeters, LessLoss Firewalls for speakers.. Constantine is like Colin, knowledgeable and easy to speak to.
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OP,
You ripped all your CDs in two days? Either you only have a few, or you may have inadvertently ripped them to a compressed low resolution format. I don’t remember how long it takes… but I generally have high performance equipment and it takes forever.
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Ripped to uncompressed FLAC, but only 150 or so CDs and 30 were purchased recently .. without having anything to play them on. Only 20 SACD, so not missing much there.
I still can’t listen to them in that the DAC in my New McIntosh MA12000 stopped working and the DAC that I ordered is still at least 2-3 weeks from delivery. So, 100% vinyl for now.
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facten
Thank You for the follow up. I head to Memphis next month for work. In the Summer of 2020 I worked in Memphis -downtown. Of course, the city was on lock-down status. I do not believe that there are any Audio shop(s) ?
I will reach out and touch Colin and Constatine regarding Cabling to complete my system which can be viewed in Virtual Systems here.
Happy Listening!
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@jafant - The audio shops that were in Memphis are long gone. Feel free to reach out when you are in Memphis
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Ok… 150… in a couple days, still must have taken some time.
i went to the vinyl store yesterday… it is still fun. Even though I listen to streaming 98% of the time.
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curiousjim
1,062 posts
08-14-2022 at 11:14am
You ever hear of “ The Incredible Broadside Brass Bed Band? LOL, I didn’t think so😁
Or "The Black Dykes Mills Brass Band"
Yep--true in the North of England!
D
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facten
Thank You- I will reach out to you soon.
Happy Listening!
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LP’s , cd, cassettes, I only,spend money on actual product,have the McCormack UDP-1, pioneer elite dv-58av,..dv-48av, dv-79-avi, and an elder 5cd Sherwood carousel which still sounds great after 20+ years,.each has their own signature tone,
evenings, I will plug in my iPod on shuffle at medium volume for background tunes when my cousin comes over for no other reason than to get so,e of my 25 year single malt
everyone does it different, I enjoy getting off my fat ass to flip the lip, and put in another cd, gives me effort to grab another beer, or pour so,e scotch in my glass.
if you stream, awesome.
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arcticdeth
Awesome collection of Players. The McCormick UDP-1 is very sweet.
How does it sound with Hard Rock/Metal ?
Happy Listening!
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I have a project rs2 transport and DAC powered by uni4 and linked i2i.
Playing this and comparing to the same albums on tidal masters had 3 of us prefering CD. Made no sense but true
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@dreas
+10! You made numerous fine points. Can’t we all just enjoy the music we love regardless of what format we have chosen to listen to. None of them are mutually exclusive, one doesn’t invalidate the others.
I happen to prefer CD listening and it’s fabulous via my Pro-Ject RS2T transport. I do not doubt for a moment that others derive as much listening enjoyment with streaming or playing vinyl records. It’s all good.
Bill , @grannyring I know that you stream and really love it. I appreciate however you aren’t beating others on the head in evangelist fashion trying to convert them to what “you” do. I like that you can acknowledge that @facten is obviously enjoying great sound quality via his Neodio CD player spinning discs.There are many ways to engage with and appreciate the “gift” of music.
Charles
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For most of us the "this or that" approach is due to financial limitations. The total system cost might be $1000.00, or $100,000.00, where the limitations exist, but the components considered are very different. It all has to do with maximizing results with limited funds. All of your posts help those of us that are operating at the upper edge of our financial envelope where trying and selling are not financially efficient. Many of you have amazing systems that you assembled through A/B comparisons. How did you setup such trials? Do you have a special relationship with a dealer, or buy used and sell used, or just don’t have financial limits? So far for me, speakers and my Integrated amp were my only main components that I heard before purchasing. I’ve been able to listen to some cables and trade up with my dealer. Currently looking to trade up with my Sutherland 20/20 phono preamp..but one dealer comes with limitations..my only real trade up option is the Esoteric E-02 Balanced and the next batch isn't scheduled for a couple of months..assuming that the components are available.
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I have had very close relationships with three dealers over the last fifty years.
My current dealer has been my friend for twenty years. I consider my current system a collaborative effort. We both love my system. He has brought over equipment (like $20K+ components) to see how they sound to evaluate if he wants to carry the line. We have very much the same musical values although he sells to many people with different values.
He has lent me a pair of Audio Research 160m mono-blocks ($32K)… for the last eight months, so far (I own a Audio Research 160s) for me to enjoy. He comes over for an afternoon every couple months to take the afternoon off. He has instructions to sell my system and give the proceeds to my partner when I die.
While I have spent thousands of hours researching and doing comparisons of equipment… components, cables, power cords… this got me up to speed to talk with my dealer… who lives this stuff day and night… for decades. We can talk as equals and learn from each other… fantastic to talk to someone with such in depth knowledge…
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