CD/DVD/BluRay Audio Quality

[mmg]

I'm currently building a new system, and I was wondering if the optical disc player I choose will affect sound quality. I am connecting the player with a digital connection. The way I understand it is that the player will just pass the digital sound information to the amplifier, which will do all the hard work of converting the digital sound to an analog signal. Is there any reason to buy a high-end player or will a budget player give the same results soundwise?

I read somewhere (http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/feb05/articles/qa0205-3.htm) that a cheap optical player could cause jitter on the digital output. I don't think this is the case, since jitter occurs in the A/D or D/A converters, right? If this is the case, how else can a cheap player affect sound quality?

 

[Cypher]

As long as you use the coaxial output or the optical output of the player everything will be fine.

I use the coaxial output of a Sony blurayplayer and use an external DAC............sounds great

 

[mmg]

So as long as I use a digital output it doesn't matter if I buy a $50 or $5000 player? How about audio over HDMI?

 

[abacus]

Digital Out: (Remember only HDMI can carry Blue-Ray HD)

Sound will be no different, however depending on the quality of the mechanism (And any error correction it has) will affect its ability to read discs, (Hence some players skip with a slightly damaged disc and others have no problem) and the more expensive should theoretically be better. (It doesn’t always work out like that though)

Analogue Out:

Some DACs in players are superior to the DACs built into receivers, so bypassing the receiver DAC may yield some improvement. (Try it a and see which output you like best, don’t worry if you can’t hear any difference between any of them)

Hope this helps

Bill

 

[Cypher]

So as long as I use a digital output it doesn't matter if I buy a $50 or $5000 player?

Good question. Theoretically all digital outputs should sound the same.........................

I used a Marantz CD6004 player with my DAC (used the coaxial output of the CD6004 player) and it sounded exactly the same as my cheap sony bluray player (BDP-490).

 

[mmg]

Thank you for your replies.

I found another article which also says that a "bad" player can cause jitter, even when using the digital outputs. I cannot post the link here since it triggers the "spam filter"...

The question remains if this jitter will be audible of course...