Has HiFi improved in the last 10 years?

[Al ears]

Can you recommend a good Frontloader Cd player?Its to go with B & W CDM1 speakers and possibly Rega Elex or Elicit Amps.A couple of years ago I asked advice about replacing the CD player and Amp. in a (year 2000) system consisting of Arcam 8SE CDplayer,Arcam Alpha 9 Amp. and B & W CDM1 speakers.The Arcam Cd player is malfunctioning despite being repaired once and the Arcam components were a lot of trouble originally so I would rather avoid this make in future.I got a bit sidetracked after getting advice on this forum (Sub Arachnoid Haemorrhage and moving house) but am now looking again to replace the Cd player and Amp.I recently listened to the originally recommended Rega Apollo and Saturn Cd players and the Rega Brio,Elex and Elicit Amps (with modern B & W speakers)and liked the Saturn and Elex or Elicit combination but found operating the Toploaders difficult-it would be a deterrent to using it I think as my manual dexterity is impaired by age and several operations for Dupuytrens.Can you recommend a good Frontloader Cd player or Cd player Amp combination?Would the Cyrus CDi go well with this set-up?My taste in music is eclectic-Dinah Washington,Artie Shaw,Bob Dylan,Oasis,light classical-nothing very loud.Thanks,RVW.

This is a very old thread.......

 

[BigH]

Start a new thread or at least bump a more recent relevant thread.

 

[Al ears]

Start a new thread or at least bump a more recent relevant thread.

+1, that's what I was implying. New thread required.

 

[chebby]

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[chebby]

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[chebby]

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[chebby]

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[chebby]

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[chebby]

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[BigH]

Or his last old one.

 

[Rethep]

I think yes! But i cannot tell exactly why. What i think that has NOT improved is cables, DAC's and CD players (only the analog part could give better results), high res and other new formats of music files.

But in speakers and amps there are a lot of newly developed concepts. I also think the good quality stuff has gotten cheaper and the best has gotten better. There are simply more roads which lead to a good endresult. There are many new speaker concepts like the 'Avantgardes', the 'Devialets', the KEF Blades, and the traditional brands use better materials in cross-overs or other speakermaterials, like drivers or cabinets.

Amps use toroidal transformers more and more. Furthermore you have the class D amps, like Devialet, or amps like the 47Labs which uses power-opamps. Tube-amps have better, and cheaper, capacitors, then ever.

The total variety of components makes more combinations possible then before. So i think the total result has improved.

 

[QuestForThe13thNote]

I reckon it has because it’s better for same cash, inflation adjusted, and it goes accross the board. One area where it certainly has changed for me is in dacs and CD players, which would be a natural progression of developing circuit design, also the way it’s possibie to make circuits so much smaller and more compact. I’d probably say not so much in speakers and amps but the point is what would cost you more 10years ago for same sound quality, can be got for much less.

 

[Rethep]

Yes circuits in DAC's have become smaller and smaller. To the point that an Airport Express (just has a small circuit DAC) gives very good sound!

In the beginning Sony and Philips defined the standard, based on theoretics. It was 44,1 kHz and 16 bits which is enough. Then many people started complaining about the 'digital sound'. But what they really heard was the sound 'deblurred' from all the analog garbage which it gathered on the way through the sound system.

In a theatre place where i worked, they bought a digital soundmixing console about 5 years ago. Some (older) people had to get used to the 'new' sound which was of course the old sound 'meant to be'.

In the beginning of digital sound all the hifi shops said they found digital 'interesting'. Of course! They wanted to sell CD players ánd record players as well. It's all a matter of commercial sales.

 

[Infiniteloop]

I think yes! But i cannot tell exactly why. What i think that has NOT improved is cables, DAC's and CD players (only the analog part could give better results), high res and other new formats of music files.

But in speakers and amps there are a lot of newly developed concepts. I also think the good quality stuff has gotten cheaper and the best has gotten better. There are simply more roads which lead to a good endresult. There are many new speaker concepts like the 'Avantgardes', the 'Devialets', the KEF Blades, and the traditional brands use better materials in cross-overs or other speakermaterials, like drivers or cabinets.

Amps use toroidal transformers more and more. Furthermore you have the class D amps, like Devialet, or amps like the 47Labs which uses power-opamps. Tube-amps have better, and cheaper, capacitors, then ever.

The total variety of components makes more combinations possible then before. So i think the total result has improved.

Devialet Amps are not strictly Class D, but are a unique hybrid of Class A and D, giving the best of both worlds.

 

[pablolie]

There hasn't been a single revolutionary break-through in audio technology.

I think there are 2 differences:

(1) Sources: Prettu darn excellent digital sources are now available for a pittance. (The turntable dudes lose out here, the Technics SL1200 that used to be a popular yet always compromised source now costs 4 times as much as it did back in the day. :-D)

(2) Very competent entry level gear that brutally showcases the law of diminishing results.

So it's not revolutionary tech, but the ability to produce excellent gear more cost efficiently.

But all in all, if you bought excellent gear even 25 years ago it'll still sound awesome as lng as it's been taken good care of.

My gear is in my sig, but I also have 15+ year old stuff (Accuphase E-306v integrated amp, Dynaudio speakers) and recent cost-efficient stuff (NAD D7050, KEF LS50) that sound min shatteringly good and I could be very happy with.

 

[Macspur]

There hasn't been a single revolutionary break-through in audio technology.

I think there are 2 differences:

(1) Sources: Prettu darn excellent digital sources are now available for a pittance. (The turntable dudes lose out here, the Technics SL1200 that used to be a popular yet always compromised source now costs 4 times as much as it did back in the day. :-D)

(2) Very competent entry level gear that brutally showcases the law of diminishing results.

So it's not revolutionary tech, but the ability to produce excellent gear more cost efficiently.

But all in all, if you bought excellent gear even 25 years ago it'll still sound awesome as lng as it's been taken good care of.

My gear is in my sig, but I also have 15+ year old stuff (Accuphase E-306v integrated amp, Dynaudio speakers) and recent cost-efficient stuff (NAD D7050, KEF LS50) that sound min shatteringly good and I could be very happy with.

Hi Pablo

Don't you use your Accuphase as your main amp? bet it's still a fabulous unit.

Mac

www.realmusicnet.wordpress.com

 

[drummerman]

Not sure. I should know in a few days with regards to amplifiers at a relatively entry level.

I think it's incremental rather than ground-breaking. There hasn't been that much new.

One item that does stand out though is the Chromecast Audio (and to an extent Video). Almost unthinkable ten years ago for that amount of money. Can't recall many items that are so fundamentally astonishing. The former uses a very capable Asahi Kasei AK4430 DAC.

Coming reasonably close and somewhat related is the proliferation of cheap 'Super Chip' Dac's. From the price of a meal for two they arguably are as good as some of the best high end Dac's a decade or so ago. Perhaps they are as good as some of the best today?

Put the above two together and it makes even more sense.

 

[plastic penguin]

Speakers have improved the most over the last decade or so. So I suppose if speakers are better then a well-suited amp should have an improved sound.

 

[pablolie]

Speaker tech truly hasn't changed that much in a long time - dynamic loudspeakers (aka the moving coil stuff most of us have) designs were basically perfected in the 1930s. Materials and measurement technology have improved. I think the big dfference is that budget loudspeakers now have become very, very good. But if you bought great speakers in the 1990s, chances are they still sound absolutely great (chances also are you had to pay quite a bit for them :-D).

The coatings and materials marketing gimmicks have just gone a bit over the top over the last few years. I have listened to very good speakers from a highly reputable company that announces new materials (and cone colors) every few years, and their 15 year old model and the newest one sounded pretty much the same.

To me again, the key difference is that now, if I plug in-ears like the Shure SE535 into my Smartphone, wow, for less than $1k I get a sound quality that would have been utterly impossible to achieve 10 years ago without spending a lot more on it. I sit in my garden listening to amazingly good sounding music - impossible back then.

My music shrine, however, doesn't sound that much better than the one I had 25 years ago, really. It's far more convenient - I don't have to get up and change CDs (I actually have no nostalgic love for vinyl and its ritual), I can stream my music from my computer using my tablet etc...

I actually still have speakers I bought in 1994, and they sound awesome. They weren't cheap though.

 

[davidf]

Speaker tech truly hasn't changed that much in a long time - dynamic loudspeakers (aka the moving coil stuff most of us have) designs were basically perfected in the 1930s. Materials and measurement technology have improved. I think the big dfference is that budget loudspeakers now have become very, very good. But if you bought great speakers in the 1990s, chances are they still sound absolutely great (chances also are you had to pay quite a bit for them :-D).

I’d agree with the highlighted sentence. Bowers & Wilkins made the biggest update to their 800 Series ever a few years ago thanks to now being able to measure aspects that were impossible to back when they introduced the series in the mid 90s. They were able to pinpoint all the negative aspects and address them, resulting in a technically better performing loudspeaker.

All the current KEF models since the Concept Blade were produced with technology that is able to measure what materials are actually doing at any given frequency, and I think because of that we now have a UniQ design that has ‘come of age’, and is probably as good as it’s going to get.

I think PMC now fall into this category too.

So yes, nothing revolutionary, but a much better understanding about the behaviour of materials has resulted in much better sounding speakers.

 

[newlash09]

Marketing has improved

 

[BigH]

Well it's nearly 10 years since this question was posted *biggrin*

 

[chebby]

All that RoHS compliant, lead-free solder will be whiskering away quietly in modern equipment leaving cockroaches and 50 year-old Sugdens to inherit the Earth.

 

[plastic penguin]

Well it's nearly 10 years since this question was posted *biggrin*

And it hasn't improved over time. *biggrin*

 

[pablolie]

>.. Bowers & Wilkins made the biggest update to their 800 Series ever a few years ago thanks to now being able to measure aspects that were impossible to back when
> they introduced the series in the mid 90s. They were able to pinpoint all the negative aspects and address them, resulting in a technically better performing
> loudspeaker.

That might just be the company I was talking about. And to me the 800 series sounds pretty much exactly the same these days, but to each their own if they feel they have to upgrade to the latest unobtanium coating on the tweeter that renders the previous one utterly obsolete and unlistenable :-D. The materials marketing is a bit of a gimmick as far as high end speakers are concerned. They used great materials then, they use great materials now. Money ain't the object. Titanium and Berrylium and Carbon and Kevlar have been around forever.

With cheaper speakers though, it's REALLY made a huge difference. Honestly, KEF LS50s may be all we ever need in a small room. The LS50 is an amazing box that benefits and highlights stuff at an impossible pricepoint 10 years ago.

I know that now some high end mags make a big deal about cabin resonances in speakers (which are most likley inaudible, but can indeed be measured). If that measrements standard was extended to acoustic instruments, Stradivarius violins would drop in value. :-D