CD player v computer-based music

[The_Lhc]

the record spot:the_lhc:

You've clearly tried to use the fact that bad recordings exist to suggest that CBM isn't worth trying.

I just spotted this; no I didn't - only in your mind. And you're wrong. There's a vast gulf in the logic between making a criticism and then what you're saying here. Miles off in fact; it doesn't even feature on the radar.

Ok, so I'll ask my last question again, if your comment regarding badly recorded material is nothing to do with CBM, then why bring it up on a CBM thread? It's clearly not a comment in favour of CBM, so if it's not against CBM, why even mention it?

 

[The_Lhc]

the record spot:You know, I lose count recently of the number of times that I've openly said in this forum that - hey! - I have an iPod! I use a laptop for iTunes!

Well done, that's more than I've got, I'll just have to apologise for not having taken the time to read every thread you've written or to remember, along with all the other people here, everything you've said.

I'm anti-CBM??? LOL, you've led a sheltered life if you think I'm anti-iPod and the like.

Alright, don't get dramatic, far from sheltered life, I'm too busy to note down the details of every forum member, as I suspect most people are. I mean can you name all the equipment I've got? Doubt it, and I'd be seriously worried if you could!

I don't use it at home for several reasons - I already get excellent sound quality from my existing hifi (see signature line below), I don't want additional boxes with attendant wires and a laptop running all day with the babies now getting active,

Don't need a laptop running all day, I have one additional box on my rack and it's the smallest one of the lot, none of the cables are visible.

plus I enjoy having the product - CD or vinyl to hand - along with the physical act of putting stuff on, selecting it from the rack, etc. Personally, I think those make valid reasons for my choice.

Yes they are and I've never tried to deny anyone that choice, but the same doesn't seem to be forthcoming from people on the other side of the fence, maybe I'm so "confrontational" on the subject because every time CBM users try to talk about the subject we have to put up with all the anti-CBM people slating us for OUR choice saying that it's inferior sound quality too inconvenient, expensive (please!), etc etc, rather than just saying "ah, it's not for me" and letting us get on with it.

As for my comments re: Ashley's previous posts, AVI have gone down the road to produce products that are geared towards that market. Hell, Ashley posts to the effect that all you need are a laptop, a DAC and away you go, whilst berating audiophiles (conveniently forgetting those who stumped up for his company's Lab Series kit at £1500 a pop would probably have been just that in some cases). Yep, sure, away you go, the route to great music.

I have to say at this point I'm NOT a big fan of Ashley's posts, no comment on his products as I've never heard them but I disagree with a lot of his statements, and I DON'T believe that plugging a laptop or PC straight into a DAC is the way to go, there's too many other things that can distract the PC and cause a glitch, network streaming is the only way I'd do it, hence my choice with Sonos, you let the network carry the data, the Sonos buffers it and that ensures uninterrupted delivery, especially if you have a NAS (I don't yet, but it's next on the list). That also gives me easy multi-room capabilities as well of course, if that's of interest (which it is to me, obviously).

Er, no, pitches like that only serve to remind me of the old CD strapline "perfect sound forever". Moreso with digital you need a decent mastering and production.

Again, why moreso? You no more need it with digital than you do with analogue. You need decent mastering and production, end of. Something I wish more producers and mastering engineers would remember...

Anyway, to my point - why are you being so confrontational?

See above, I got a bit ahead of myself and answered this already.

Are you so blinkered by your view you've no width to accommodate mine?

Up until now I had no idea what your view was, just a seemingly random comment about mastering that I couldn't see had any direct relevance to CBM. Incidentally, I should probably mention here that I have two turntables (both in use, yes) and no CD player, so I'm certainly not anti-analogue, if that's what you're thinking.

"Make up negatives out of thin air"? LOL, please...

Do point out, incidentally, where I said the issues affecting digital were applicable in isolation to any other format.

I'm not sure I ever said you did? What issues affect digital alone? Error correction, that's about all I can think of, certainly doesn't apply to mastering and production, as I said above, that's just as relevant to analogue formats.

Having been listening to music on a variety of formats since the late 1960s I think I'm reasonably well versed to work out that we're supplied with the means to enjoy music to a higher standard now than ever before.

I don't have the benefit of your experience because I'm not that old, but I can't argue with that statement.

The convenience and degree of quality open to us now is unparalleled.

Agreed.

All I'm saying is it won't make the difference you hope for unless you have a decent recording to start off with.

And again I'm saying:

1) I don't know what "difference" you're talking about, nobody's ever said that CBM will be massively better quality than CD (I certainly haven't anyway), there might be a marginal improvement if you believe the error-correction line but all I expect is that it's at least as good as CD, with the convenience of being able to play any track I want, in any order. If you're talking about 96khz/24-bit stuff then fine that should sound better, but that's down to the resolution of the recording (and yes the original mastering and production makes a difference but see point 2), rather than any magical CBM trickery.

2) Again, you need a decent recording whatever you're listening to, vinyl, CD, SACD, cbm, direct cranial transmission, it makes no difference, if you put sh*t in, you get sh*t out

It's not difficult.

No need to be patronising.

Unless that's what you're trying to do of course - you don't need to defend CBM to me.

In my view, it is horses for courses, play what you like on what you like. Doesn't mean one can't offer up a criticism on some aspects of the medium however, particularly when it is being pitched in the way it often is.

This is what I'm saying though, so far I don't even know what your criticism of the medium is, ensuring you have a decent recording certainly isn't one as that applies to all media, that's why I'm questioning what you said, because I don't know why you said it.

 

[the record spot]

the_lhc:

Don't need a laptop running all day, I have one additional box on my rack and it's the smallest one of the lot, none of the cables are visible.

Fairly do's but if you get AVI ADM 9.1s the recommendation is a Mac streaming iTunes I think. I'm sure that's not the only product they do but the clear implication from AVI is Mac based. You get the jist, even if Mac owners are currently birling at the thought of being lumped in with Windows based laptops.

the_lhc:

Yes they are and I've never tried to deny anyone that choice, but the same doesn't seem to be forthcoming from people on the other side of the fence, maybe I'm so "confrontational" on the subject because every time CBM users try to talk about the subject we have to put up with all the anti-CBM people slating us for OUR choice saying that it's inferior sound quality too inconvenient, expensive (please!), etc etc, rather than just saying "ah, it's not for me" and letting us get on with it.

I'll redirect you towards my "listen to what you like on what you like" line from an earlier post. Seriously, if shellac cuts it for someone on a beat up 1910 gramophone, I'm back 'em all the way. Personally, I'm a Dansette man myself. We're on the same page here; this is hair's breadth stuff, not yawing chasm we're talking about.

the_lhc:
I have to say at this point I'm NOT a big fan of Ashley's posts, no comment on his products as I've never heard them but I disagree with a lot of his statements, and I DON'T believe that plugging a laptop or PC straight into a DAC is the way to go, there's too many other things that can distract the PC and cause a glitch, network streaming is the only way I'd do it, hence my choice with Sonos, you let the network carry the data, the Sonos buffers it and that ensures uninterrupted delivery, especially if you have a NAS (I don't yet, but it's next on the list). That also gives me easy multi-room capabilities as well of course, if that's of interest (which it is to me, obviously).

Which is great, but it's all one step too many for me and for my earlier mentioned reasons. I have the iPod for when I'm on the go, which is a lot these days, or when I pop into town at weekends, but otherwise, I'm very happy with the present set-up, even if two of the three current components are over a decade old and in the case of the speakers, probably a good 15 years old now.

the_lhc:

Again, why moreso? You no more need it with digital than you do with analogue. You need decent mastering and production, end of.

Well, my view here is you need it moreso as I think digital can be rather revealing today than vinyl was say 30 years ago. That's not true in all cases, but good quality affordable hifi was in the minority back then, maybe even 25 years ago and it's only in relatively recent years that high quality has become genuinely available to most people (if they want it). As a consequence, a bad album on record could be 'masked' to some degree as the gear wasn't up to revealing how bad an album was done/overcooked. Plus, it was probably an even smaller minority than we have now who were into good quality audio playback; the issue probably never registered often.

Now, when someone comes along with a pair of speakers and says all you need to get great sound quality are a laptop and a DAC, it's as if I'm thinking "kind of..."!

the_lhc:
This is what I'm saying though, so far I don't even know what your criticism of the medium is, ensuring you have a decent recording certainly isn't one as that applies to all media, that's why I'm questioning what you said, because I don't know why you said it.

That's fair enough; the medium itself is fine, slightly more cumbersome than I tradtionally prefer, but that's a side issue. It comes down to opinion and what ticks more boxes and I'm for and against elements of computer based music. Conevenient and flexible, good quality, allows near immediate access to a wide range of artists, so widening both the accessibility and the appeal of music for people to enjoy - all good so far.

The downsides would be it might (too kate, it already has) cheapen how the record companies and producers deliver their albums from a quality perspective to their respective markets; the trend to beef up the sound artifically for mp3 players is a bad one IMO. It also removes you one step more from the physical medium of holding the sleeve or CD in your hand, which I've mentioned before is one of the most appealing things for me.

 

[The_Lhc]

the record spot:the_lhc:

Don't need a laptop running all day, I have one additional box on my rack and it's the smallest one of the lot, none of the cables are visible.

Fairly do's but if you get AVI ADM 9.1s the recommendation is a Mac streaming iTunes I think. I'm sure that's not the only product they do but the clear implication from AVI is Mac based. You get the jist,

Yeah, well, like I said, I wouldn't agree with that at all, if I had AVIs active speakers, I'd probably just plug the Sonos straight into them, that way it doesn't matter what's at the other end, MAC, PC, NAS, it's platform agnostic, which I think is a good idea these days, if you want to sell to as many people as possible. I wonder if AVI are doing themselves out of any sales because people think they're a Mac only solution?

even if Mac owners are currently birling at the thought of being lumped in with Windows based laptops.

Currently what?

the_lhc:

Yes they are and I've never tried to deny anyone that choice, but the same doesn't seem to be forthcoming from people on the other side of the fence, maybe I'm so "confrontational" on the subject because every time CBM users try to talk about the subject we have to put up with all the anti-CBM people slating us for OUR choice saying that it's inferior sound quality too inconvenient, expensive (please!), etc etc, rather than just saying "ah, it's not for me" and letting us get on with it.

I'll redirect you towards my "listen to what you like on what you like" line from an earlier post. Seriously, if shellac cuts it for someone on a beat up 1910 gramophone, I'm back 'em all the way. Personally, I'm a Dansette man myself. We're on the same page here; this is hair's breadth stuff, not yawing chasm we're talking about.

Yes, my missus has got a Dansette (well that's what she calls it...) she keeps threatening to play my 78s on it but I keep telling her not until it's had an overhaul, no telling what damage might be done...

the_lhc:
I have to say at this point I'm NOT a big fan of Ashley's posts, no comment on his products as I've never heard them but I disagree with a lot of his statements, and I DON'T believe that plugging a laptop or PC straight into a DAC is the way to go, there's too many other things that can distract the PC and cause a glitch, network streaming is the only way I'd do it, hence my choice with Sonos, you let the network carry the data, the Sonos buffers it and that ensures uninterrupted delivery, especially if you have a NAS (I don't yet, but it's next on the list). That also gives me easy multi-room capabilities as well of course, if that's of interest (which it is to me, obviously).

Which is great, but it's all one step too many for me and for my earlier mentioned reasons. I have the iPod for when I'm on the go, which is a lot these days, or when I pop into town at weekends, but otherwise, I'm very happy with the present set-up, even if two of the three current components are over a decade old and in the case of the speakers, probably a good 15 years old now.

Yeah most of my kit is about ten years old at the moment, I only went with the Sonos for multi-room and easy access to all my tunes (which were on the PC already).

the_lhc: Again, why moreso? You no more need it with digital than you do with analogue. You need decent mastering and production, end of.

Well, my view here is you need it moreso as I think digital can be rather revealing today than vinyl was say 30 years ago. That's not true in all cases, but good quality affordable hifi was in the minority back then, maybe even 25 years ago and it's only in relatively recent years that high quality has become genuinely available to most people (if they want it). As a consequence, a bad album on record could be 'masked' to some degree as the gear wasn't up to revealing how bad an album was done/overcooked. Plus, it was probably an even smaller minority than we have now who were into good quality audio playback; the issue probably never registered often.

Now, when someone comes along with a pair of speakers and says all you need to get great sound quality are a laptop and a DAC, it's as if I'm thinking "kind of..."!

I see your point but I'd argue that vinyl reproduction now is probably far better than it was for most 30 years ago. I've only got a couple of Project decks but I daresay they'd be better than most turntables that "normal" people were listening to in the 70s.

the_lhc:
This is what I'm saying though, so far I don't even know what your criticism of the medium is, ensuring you have a decent recording certainly isn't one as that applies to all media, that's why I'm questioning what you said, because I don't know why you said it.

That's fair enough; the medium itself is fine, slightly more cumbersome than I tradtionally prefer, but that's a side issue.

Depends how you look at it, if I wanted I could hide all my cbm equipment. The PC is already upstairs, the sonos box doesn't need to be seen at all, as long as it's connected to the network and the amp, all I'm left with is the remote, which is wireless. In fact sooner or later I will be hiding it all, only the speakers will be on show.

It comes down to opinion and what ticks more boxes and I'm for and against elements of computer based music. Conevenient and flexible, good quality, allows near immediate access to a wide range of artists, so widening both the accessibility and the appeal of music for people to enjoy - all good so far.

The downsides would be it might (too kate, it already has) cheapen how the record companies and producers deliver their albums from a quality perspective to their respective markets; the trend to beef up the sound artifically for mp3 players is a bad one IMO.

I agree, but it's not a new trend, it's been going on since before mp3 was even invented! Have a search for "Loudness War", this has been happening since CD was invented.

It also removes you one step more from the physical medium of holding the sleeve or CD in your hand, which I've mentioned before is one of the most appealing things for me.

I have a good sniff when I first buy a CD or album (literally!) but I don't feel the need to go back to it after that. Mind you as a consequence of that I can't name most of the tracks that I listen to on any new albums (although they're displayed on the remote of course...)!

 

[bobdupuy]

I hope it's not to late to resurrect this issue. I have been using computer-based music exclusively for a year now, both from Internet radio sites and from my own modest CD collection ripped to FLAC files on my hard drive using JRiver. I have a Dell Desktop and I connect using USB through an Arcam rPac to my Yamaha R-S500 Integrated amp. The sound quality is great, BUT I have a noise problem that just won't go away. I would describe the noise as more like brief interruptions in the sound, sometimes sounding much like when you bump a turntable and the stylus bounces a little. There is no way to predict the frequency of these events; at times they occur fairly frequently and sometimes they will not occur for a couple of hours. I have had an electrician install a separate ground forthe electrical outlets that I use in order to eliminate any RFI from AC and applicances, but that did not eliminate the problem. So I connected a DVD player directly to my Yamaha and played a CD, and there is no noise with this setup. Therefore the noise is coming from the computer or the rPac. I don't think it is the rPac, because I had the same problem before I added it. Since I am not going to buy a new computer, I am going to get a quality CD deck to attach directly though my Yamaha amp. But then, how can I rip CD's from that to my computer? And even if I can rip CD's from the separate CD deck, wouldn't I still encounter the same noise problem during playback of those FLAC files?

 

[BigH]

I hope it's not to late to resurrect this issue. I have been using computer-based music exclusively for a year now, both from Internet radio sites and from my own modest CD collection ripped to FLAC files on my hard drive using JRiver. I have a Dell Desktop and I connect using USB through an Arcam rPac to my Yamaha R-S500 Integrated amp. The sound quality is great, BUT I have a noise problem that just won't go away. I would describe the noise as more like brief interruptions in the sound, sometimes sounding much like when you bump a turntable and the stylus bounces a little. There is no way to predict the frequency of these events; at times they occur fairly frequently and sometimes they will not occur for a couple of hours. I have had an electrician install a separate ground forthe electrical outlets that I use in order to eliminate any RFI from AC and applicances, but that did not eliminate the problem. So I connected a DVD player directly to my Yamaha and played a CD, and there is no noise with this setup. Therefore the noise is coming from the computer or the rPac. I don't think it is the rPac, because I had the same problem before I added it. Since I am not going to buy a new computer, I am going to get a quality CD deck to attach directly though my Yamaha amp. But then, how can I rip CD's from that to my computer? And even if I can rip CD's from the separate CD deck, wouldn't I still encounter the same noise problem during playback of those FLAC files?

Could it be the fan coming on?

You could try a SSD HD which have no moving parts and are almost silent when operating. Dell are pretty poor quality.

 

[p_m_brown]

Internet issues? Sorry for the simplistic approach there but I have wired my Sonos/Nas directly to my AirPort Extreme and have no such drop outs.

 

[MakkaPakka]

I'd say it's worth trying a hard disk scan in case you have any read errors.

Also check CPU usage as if it's high the sound can stutter.

 

[BigH]

If its drop-outs could be the interconnect cables? On internet could be various things, like router/hub, internet connection etc. Never had any problems on mine.

 

[DylanFan]

As its occurring with streaming & different file formats I would be looking at the PC load - DELL use a variety of HD's even a slow hard drive will still be able to supply audio which is no stress at all compared to video - Have you tried disabling temporary your av/anti-malware, that's the first thing i would try & what the PC is running when at idle - HW-Info > http://www.hwinfo.com/ < which is free should let you know the amount of RAM in use & whether you have any overheating problems etc. Even a badly fragmented disc could cause problems though it would have to be really bad - Check the hard drive power & SATA connections as they can easily become dislodged - Borrowing & substituting a different PC will quickly decide if its the PC or not - Lack of memory could force a PC into using the hard drive as virtual memory which isn't good but that don't happen much these days.