Does a cd player really make THAT much of a difference?

[SHAXOS]

Its probibly been brought up before and i know the old "Rubbish in rubbish out" saying. But i recently took delivery of a new amp. Unfortunantly because parcelforce are incompetant fools they sent my xray v8 back to london so ive got to wait longer for my "complete" system. Anyway the thing is that even playing cds through my xbox it wipes the floor with my last system which included a cyrus cd8x cd player. This got me thinking does a cd player actually make that much of a difference? Or is the xbox 360 an uber disk player? Be funny if i cant tell the difference, but im in for a treat if it manages to sound better!

 

[Mike_Schmidt]

were you sober when you wrote this or looking for a argument? A xbox better than a 8X, what differences were there and what made it wipe the floor. Sorry this one i just dont get

 

[northantsbloke34]

Must be a wind up, really an xbox? chuckle...

 

[up the music]

Was your old amp really, really bad?

 

[Anonymous]

If my memory serves me correctly, Shaxos has upgraded to a Musical Fidelity KW of some sort. I understand where he's coming from.

 

[Anonymous]

the xbox360 as cd player to beat cyrus cd8x never no way ,- i have tried the xbox as cd player no way its no good-- also tried it as transport to feed digital stream to musical fidelity x-dac v3 this was not much better sounding either,i can only say if you think xbox is good, then wait till you hear your x-ray v8.

 

[matthewpiano]

The straight forward answer to your question is YES. When I changed from Arcam to my current Cambridge Audio kit I started by changing my A70 for the 740A amp. The sound made a definite movement in the right direction - more open, more drive, more detail, greater sense of realism and airiness. However, the slightly thick midband of the CD73 was still clearly audible. Changing to the 740C made the system sound complete. Everything suddenly snapped into focus and there was a sense of balance to the sound that the CD73 just didn't provide.

As for the XBox 360 being even a reasonable CD player... makes me laugh. Quite apart from the ridiculous amount of fan noise which is very intrusive when listening to music, as an audio player even doesn't even touch budget machines such as the NAD C315 or the Cambridge Azur 340C. 'Uber disk player' the 360 is not.

 

[SHAXOS]

Firstly Mike no i was not trying to start an arguement - ive got better things to do.

Not once in my post did i say that the 360 is a better player than the cd8x. Niether was i arguing the 360 is an amazing player. I have upgraded my amp to a MF kw550 and was simply stating the massive leap in quality is just attributed to the amp as the cds are being played by the xbox. My previous system was bel canto pre and power and a cd8x. The kw550 fed through an xbox sounds better hands down. This is not a dig at the cd8x or the bel canto which was fabulous also (i paid the best part of 2500 for them!) but more a testament to how good the amp is. My post is simply raising the question whether a cd player makes THAT MUCH of a difference (not arguing there is no difference). As surley my new amp fed through a 360 should not sound as good as my old system?

 

[JoelSim]

Yes it makes a huge difference

 

[SHAXOS]

Also i would like to add that i really DO hope there is a differnce as 1) money has been spent 2) to me it sounds amazing now - if it gets better like i said im in for a treat.

 

[Anonymous]

You'll be in for a real treat! The Xbox is a horrid cd player. It's **** poor, compared to my Marantz it lacks drive, bass is sucked out, and the definition just isn't there, at all! When you get your dedicated cd player back you'll be astounded at how big the difference really is.

 

[Mike_Schmidt]

I think your in for a treat, enjoy it when it comes.

 

[Anonymous]

JoelSim:Yes it makes a huge difference

It depends on how fussy you are some folk will claim that that dvd is plenty good enough and theres no need for blu disks so by the same logic your xbox will make a fine CDP ;-)

 

[Anonymous]

Course it makes a difference, but I can see how the sound of a system with better amp and speakers, but cheap CD player can beat a more lowly system with even a super expensive player. The CD as a digital source is nowhere near as important as it used to be with analogue.

 

[the record spot]

Well, there was the chat a few years back that one of the original PS1's was along the same lines - supposed to be a brilliant player. Slightly more believable with it being Sony. I hear Wadia are thinking about revisiting their designs for next year....

 

[Thaiman]

I am waiting for Ashley to join in and tell us that all cd player with same DAC sound the same!

IMO though many sound very similar (NOT the same) and few sound amazingly good. It all down to personal taste i reckon.

Some like HIFI sounding machine like MF, Audio Analog, Cyrus, Cambridge Audio etc... and some like the organic sounding gears like Sugden, Rega, Wadia mentioned above and so on.

 

[drummerman]

Well, I won't comment on your remark about AVI which is clearly looking for an argument, though I'm not quite sure why.

Your second and third paragraphs I agree entirely with. Personally, a cdp can't be to neutral, detailed and revealing to me. Its the source and has to play as much of whats there as poss though most of todays players do that, the emphasis being on different rather than better often. Something easily shown with CA's Dacmagic and the different filter settings though that product can of course be bettered too. Same really for every component speakers included but if I wanted to loose/change or impart some character on the system for whatever reason I'd rather do it 'down the line' of the chain. Bearing in mind that speakers have by far the greatest amount of distortion and character I'd do it there and go for neutrality with amplifier and source.

Having said that, I currently have some of CA's products here and as good as they are (very) this perhaps is a step to far into neutrality and control at least with the speakers I have at my disposal which are nowhere near as good as the CA products deserve so I will rectify that this week if possible.

 

[Ajani]

SHAXOS:Its probibly been brought up before and i know the old "Rubbish in rubbish out" saying. But i recently took delivery of a new amp. Unfortunantly because parcelforce are incompetant fools they sent my xray v8 back to london so ive got to wait longer for my "complete" system. Anyway the thing is that even playing cds through my xbox it wipes the floor with my last system which included a cyrus cd8x cd player. This got me thinking does a cd player actually make that much of a difference? Or is the xbox 360 an uber disk player? Be funny if i cant tell the difference, but im in for a treat if it manages to sound better!

A lot of people have tried a similar experiment to what you've ended up doing... Pairing a cheap digital source with a Good Amp and Speakers can certainly yield some amazing results... However, I'd still expect you to hear a significant upgrade in sound quality when your X-Ray V8 arrives...

 

[Thaiman]

drummerman:

Well, I won't comment on your remark about AVI which is clearly looking for an argument, though I'm not quite sure why.

Sorry if it came across that way...I was having a little funny dig at Ashley which I have been told many times that he is one of the nicest guy in hifi industry.

 

[drummerman]

He's cool, friendly and very, very small

 

[Anonymous]

So has SHAZOS got his cd player yet? I am awaiting the formal comparison between the xray and xbox..... Could be a close contest!

 

[SHAXOS]

No not yet. Should have it by tue/wed next week. Ill let you know what i think

 

[Anonymous]

SHAXOS:No not yet. Should have it by tue/wed next week. Ill let you know what i think

you'd better. I am tempted by a Cyrus CD6SE so if an XBox is better.......saves me £800 lol.

 

[HDNumpty]

To test this, I have just swopped my CD92 for my little girl's spinning top and there was no difference in audio quality. Until it stopped, then I had to wind it up again.

Why oh why did I spend ALL THAT MONEY????

 

[HDNumpty]

...and here's my serious answer, which is of course ABSOLUTELY. Through the summer I upgraded my Marantz amp to the CA 840a and got some improvement, notably with fine detail on certain recordings. But only when I swopped my CA 640c for a far superior (but old-ish) Arcam in the last few weeks did I REALLY hear the difference your source can make. Elvis was almost in the building, but now he has entered...