Apple TV or CA Azur 640c V2 ?

[admin_exported]

I've put together a low end HiFi system for my small living room. It's a Cambridge Audio DacMagic connected to a Marantz PM6002 powering a pair of KEF Q10 speakers and Grado SR125 headphones.

It's all I need for the moment and it's quite a nice sound on a budget. At the moment I'm using my iMac (iTunes) to send Lossless audio to the DacMagic.

I don't always want to have my iMac on when listening to music, and so I started to look at other (cheap) options.

Option one, is to buy the Apple TV 160GB (use my iPhone as a remote as I don't have a TV) to play my lossless albums from it. £140 used.

Option two, is buy the CA Azur 640c V2 player and start listening to CD's again. £149 new.

Not having to handle/change CD all the time, would be more conveniant, however would the Azur 640c give better sound than the apple TV?

Mind you both would be connected to the DacMagic via optical anyways.

thanks in advance

 

[Anonymous]

Well DomTom I have been dicing with the idea of going down the hard-drive media route as I have a huge collection of tunes on my pc, as well as phots and a few movies, and was nearly decided till I dug out a few favourite CD's and cranked it up while I painted our daughters bedroom...

I have to say that I have got so used to my iTunes library being fed through my Cambridge Audio Azur 640R amp and vintage Acoustic Research AR17 speakers that I had forgotten what CDs actually sound like...and I have to say that I have had a complete change of mind...the Cds have so much more depth, range and emotion to them than the digital files on my PC. No doubt it may be different using a dedicated player to stream my tunes to the amp, but I honestly doubt it could come close to the sound from a Cd player. I am only using a Denon DVD-1920 at the moment but now intend to upgrade to the new Cambridge 650 bluray Universal player as soon as possible ( or prices come down a bit !) which should bring an added dimension to my CD music colection, not to mention DVDs and Blurays !!!

I would suggest that the 'inconvenience' of changing your Cd is all part of the experience and the sound quality is undisputably better...CD is still King in my opinion !!! Hope this helps and doesn't open a new can of worms for you !!!

 

[Dermondo]

I would second that to, I think there is no sustitute to the sound a cd produces, of course accompanied by a decent cd player, amp speakers, cables and positioned correctly.

I also dug out of few cds over the weekend too and it still has that tingle factor and is a delight and a pleasure to listen to and quite honestly is addictive which is a true testament to the sound a cd makes.

I do understand mp3 sound files etc. have their advantages but for me do not come near cd audio quality.

 

[Anonymous]

Hear Hear !!!

 

[vinod_david]

+1 +2 to all the above wrt to cd sq.

 

[John Duncan]

-1 to all of the above. Get the Apple TV.

 

[AL13N]

In theory, as you already have the DacMagic, all the Apple TV and CA 640C will be doing is sending 1s + 0s to the DAC. However, the CDP will have the added task of realtime error correction.

Having said that (and despite it sometimes seeming the complete opposite!) this hobby is not all about numbers and figures. It's about how your brain processes them. I'd say get down to your local Apple store and Richer Sounds and have a listen.

 

[AL13N]

Actually, why don't you save the money and try this:

Computer on, running a bunch of processes, full brightness = 125 Watts
Computer on, highest brightness = 100 Watts
Computer on, lowest brightness = 77 Watts
Screen turned off (press Shift + Control + Eject) = 30 Watts
Computer sleeping = 4 Watts average
Computer off = 0 Watts

As you already have an iPhone you can use this to control things (just like you would with the Apple TV).

 

[Dave_]

JohnDuncan:-1 to all of the above. Get the Apple TV.And i'll second that...

 

[Anonymous]

You guys are great.. thanks for all the responses... I was kind of leaning towards the CD player option.

If I want to have easy access to all my music at once, I guess I can just use the iMac with screen turned off, and the iphone as a remote. Thanks for the hint.

However now I do think I might save my money now, and get the Azur 650BD player in order to play DVD's, SACD,

and Blue-Ray Discs in the future.

thanks Again.

 

[Anonymous]

Unsurprisingly, I'm in total agreement with your decision but slightly surprised also as you mentioned you don't have a TV ??!! Guess that's another purchase to be amde then ? May I suggest a Panasonic....oh, but that's another thread altogether....good luck and will look out for you down at Richer Sounds !!!

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks Ricardo. Yes I don't own a TV. I haven't had one since I moved from Canada to the UK 5 years ago, and to tell you the truth I don't miss it at all. I do however use my iMac for watching DVDs and occasionaly iplayer.

I mush prefer spending my time listening to a good album by... Clapton, Floyd, Peter Gabriel, Fleetwood Mac, Straits, Vangelis or Dave Matthews.

Cheers

 

[Anonymous]

no problem DomTom, lot of similarities then as i spent time in BC & Quebec, and similar music choice too, but couldn't live without my 37" Panasonic that I love for films and also us as a PC monitor incidentally !! And as I am a Mathews I can't fault your choice of Dave either !!!

I will be saving for the CA 650 this year too and look forward to the full HD experience...good luck with your hifi purchase anyway but I must warn you, this whole hifi thing becomes a bit obsessive (especially in the UK where you're spoilt for choice with domestic products) and can become a way of life striving for that elusive top audio quality experience. You will be amazed with what you've been missing when you get a dedicated hifi and then there's the home cinema side of it too...it's never ending, But great fun. There's alot worse you could be doing !!!

 

[AL13N]

DomTom:However now I do think I might save my money now, and get the Azur 650BD player in order to play DVD's, SACD, and Blue-Ray Discs in the future ... Yes I don't own a TV
If you're going to use the CA 650BD for audio only, then why not purchase 24bit downloads. Of course, these take up more HDD space, so instead of a disc player you could buy a NAS drive for both extra storage and backup. You could even burn your DVDs onto it for instant access to all your media.

However, if your going to purchase a TV in future then the CA 650BD would be an excellent option. You can even burn 24bit downloads on to DVD (as DVD-A using the appropiate software) and play them back on the 650BD. So no matter what direction the future of music playback goes, your covered (unless DSD Discs take off

).

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

Stream it.

 

[John Duncan]

Hmm. Whilst I ran my @TV audio-only, you might have some difficulty getting it set up if you don't have a TV at all...

 

[Laceybloke]

Just to add my two-pence worth, if you're considering the Apple TV only for music streaming purposes, then you can suffice with the Apple Airport Express instead. It'll stream your lossless files from your computer over wifi or ethernet, and you can take an optical digital feed out of it into your Dacmagic. It's a lot cheaper than the Apple TV as well. Not only that, but it works beautifully with the Apple Remote app on the iPhone/iPod Touch.

This is a very similar setup to what I use (although I've got the Firestone Fubar IV rather than the Dacmagic) but the principle is exactly the same and the results are superb.

If you want some instructions, you can see my setup here and if you're interested in how it works with the DAC, have a look at this.

I realise that you didn't want to have your computer on all the time, but with the screen off it'll be using the same electricity as the Apple TV anyway - and as John points out, setting up the Apple TV could cause you some issues if you don't have a screen!

 

[matthewpiano]

Lossless files can sound every bit as good as CD. Having said that I wouldn't want to be without my CD player and I still prefer the whole physical experience of handling the disc, reading the liner notes etc.

I use a Squeezebox 3 for my streaming and it works superbly. Using the internal DAC it sounds excellent and I highly recommend having a good look at the Squeezebox product range. I will be upgrading mine to a Squeezebox Touch once funds allow.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks again guys. A lot to think about. For the time being I'm going to stick with using the iMac with the screen off when just listening to music.

I did look at the Squeezebox and apple TV, plus a few other options.. a shame that the Olive 4HD is over my budget 😉

don't get me wrong.. I don't mind physical CD's and the whole experience. I use to play a lot of vinyl before leaving my records to my brother, back in Canada.

cheers