Getting the best from my system?

[PLuKE]

I want to know people's thoughts.

Setup:

B&W 685's bi wired (QED Silver Anni)

NAD320BEE

Cambridge Audio ID50 dock for Ipod ( connected with QED Qunex 1)

i try to download my music in 320kbps in MP3 format

Is the ID50 a good piece of audio, I know the MP3s would be the biggest let down? But in 320kbps there surely very good?

Thanks

Luke

 

[nopiano]

It's all relative, Luke. Compared to a CD, mp3 is inferior for many people. An iPod is not a traditional hifi source either, it's a portable.

Have you heard a good CD player or turntable?

If you have a laptop, some hi-res downloads and a £150 DAC will blow your mp3s into yesterday!

What are you hoping to achieve?

 

[ID.]

Because you download I guess you don't have the opportunity to reacquire the tracks in lossless. That's why I still buy and rip CDs.

SOme say they can't hear the difference between 3230 kbps and lossless, so you might not be missing out on much anyway.

I guess you could get a digital dock like the id100 (I use Onkyo's SD-N1000 and ND-S100) and buy a DAC which would provide better digital to analogue conversion than the iPod's internal DAC. It may not be quite up to the level of a CD player due to the lower resolution files, but should be superior to using an analogue iPod dock.