SACD & DVD-AUDIO player and AMP

[admin_exported]

I'm thinking of replacing my disc player and Amp, and my main sources are SACD, DVD-AUDIO and DTS discs for music. I want to use HDMI as the connection.

I'm thinking of the Cambridges Audio Azur 650 BD along with the Pioneer VSX-LX53, but I'm not sure if they match up.

From The User manual for the player, for SACD, the 650 outputs DSD & PCM over HDMI. For DVD-AUDIO, I can't find anything about what it passes over to the AMP via HDMI.

Can you pleae tell me if these two machines are compatible?

Rob.

 

[Tom Moreno]

I have the Oppo BDP-83 which is very similar to the CA deck's firmware (almost identical in some regards) and it decodes the DVD-Audio's MLP track internally to PCM and outputs the PCM via HDMI. When listening to SACD I found the best results were outputting the DSD stream to the AVR to decode, for some reason when converting the DSD stream to PCM inside the player to output to the AVR there was an un-natural boost in level to the sub channel. This may or may not be present on the CA deck, but worth looking out for.

 

[DandyCobalt]

Hi Rob,

I have exactly this set-up (650BD going through to LX53) via HDMI and the results are superb. I output bitstream from the CA through to the amp and let the amp do the decoding. I haven't had the spare time yet to A/B with the amp sending PCM instead (but can be done). I've tested it with SACD (the Linn SACDs, Norah Jones etc) and have also played DVD-Audio (REM Automatic for the People, Fleetwood Mac etc), plus Blu-ray audio ( the Ole Bull 2L production). Oh, stereo is not bad too.(there also is a nice Stereo wide setting which works well with basic tv etc).

I only have Q-Acoustic Floorstanders at the moment, coupled with QA centre speaker and Kef surrounds, but the sound is still excellent.

Visually, we've been very pleased with the 650, and also link it to an HD Sony projector - excellent image, motion, upscaling and quick loading .

Sevenoaks S&V now have £150 off the LX53, now £1050 (Sevenoaks branch) so a bit gutted. They also have the 2020 at similar discount if you don't want the metal front and bluetooth dongle.

 

[Anonymous]

Much appreciate your findings. Thanks very much.

 

[DandyCobalt]

I've just played a DVD-Audio (REM's Automatic for the People - superb example of 5.1 mixing) on the 650 and LX53, and it goes through to the amp as PCM. The settings on the 650 Setup menu (devices) has a line for DVD-Audio but it is fixed as a greyed option as "DVD-Audio". i.e. no freedom to adjust what is output through this setup menu, but maybe through the on-screen options on the DVD-Audio disc itself, depending on disc? Hope that helps.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks again.