B&W CM10 S2 loudspeakers

[jayne lee wilson]

I don't do the esoteric domestic hi-fi thing
but do wonder why people spend so much on DAC's (ignoring the woo nonsense of £1,000 IEC mains leads) when the places where the audio is edited and mastered tend to use these.

http://www.rme-audio.de/en/index.php

A RME interface is likely to sound much much better and be more stable and accurate than any of the black slab, glass pyramid, glowing chrome orb nonsense.

One of those and a pair of Genelec's ?

I guess the simplest answer would be the lack of reviews or promos in the HFN etc., but looking through the specs there would be many functions I'd never use (incl. 2xHP outputs), probably complicating my own ease-of-use through complex analytical displays & just too many options....

Which, er, glass pyramids did you have in mind? My own T&A Dac 8 is solidly made, but pretty sober, functional, very useful choice of playback filters, (as did my previous Cambridge DacMagic). Slickly efficient & easy to get the hang of, too. Does what I want & sounds so fine I'd never expect to change it. (And no, I didn't pay rrp on it either...)
There are many good sub-£1000 hifi Dacs now, shorn of unnecessary functions or fanciful aesthetics (having said which, what's wrong with wanting a hifi component to feel nice under-the-fingers or look good? Or paying more to get that?).

Never overlook ease-of-use as a hifi (or any technological) priority...(JRiverMC notwithstanding ...)

[richardfinegold]

What's a DAC please? You see, I'm trying to buy good gear and don't know much about it!! I bought the speakers from Melbourne, not the same dealer who showed me the Densen CD player - which he demonstrated on the same speakers I've bought and which sounded fantastic. Compared to NAD and Marantz - well, there was NO comparison. I'm only worried because Densen is not making this CD player any more and servicing etc. could be an issue. Well, it WILL be an issue !! Perhaps I'll look at the Roksan CD players at the hifi shop in central Sydney. Will also need a good amplifier but may be able to get an 80w NAD at another place.

This is driving me mad!!

I wrote a long response on my ipad which dissapeared into Appleland before I could hit post. I will answer you in a few seperate
posts to prevent that from happening again. Good thing today is a Holiday here, as we celebrate throwing off a certain despotic power which opressed our aspirations and charged us an extra penny for each pound of tea...
First, Tetra, I think that you shouldtake a deep breath and relax. You are talking about spending some serious money here, and it would be worth the time to do some basic reading about Audio before you spend it, so that you have an idea of how to proceed.
If you don't currently have a system to play back music, and are desperate to have something, perhaps you could buy some second hand components on the cheap while you do some research, and then spend your money after you feel more confident. If otoh you have a workable system, continue to use it while you do research.
I would suggest Robert Harley's books about Audio. He isthe Editor of the Audiophile magazine The Absolute Sound and has written a series of books about High End Audio that are useful for the beginner and the veteran alike. You probably can find inexpensive second hand copies on the internet or perhaps check your local library. I found them useful when I began getting serious about Audio
and also hada hard time deciphering the lingo. i think one reason that the High End Audio system is shrinking is that the terminology
scares people.
to be continued

[richardfinegold]

Perhaps you don't understand the difference between Digital and Analog sound. When a musician makes music, or you and I talk, the sounds emitted can be represented as a wave form, also known as an analog wave form. In Audio, some sources are Purely analog, such as a turntable or an FM broadcast. These sources emit an analog wave form which then has to be modified somewhat by the amplification components before it is fed to speakers. Speakers then emit the electronic signal they have received from the amplifier(s) back into the waveform that we hear.
Digital sources start with a digital signal which consists of a long stream of ones and zeroes in varying combinations. The digits then have to be converted, somewhere in the reproduction chain, to an analog wave form, so that we hear music, not digital squeaks.
A Digitial to Analog Converter (DAC) does just that.
tbc...

[richardfinegold]

Many digital sources come with some sort of included DAC.
A CD Player is basically a modified computer, with an operating system that specializes in 2 functions: 1) The transport, which reads the digits off the CD, and then sends that digital feed to 2) The DAC, which converts those digits into an analog wave form, and sends the wave form to the amplifier.
Computers and their related peripherals these days are made without a CD drive, and the digits are read from a Hard Drive, and then sent to a DAC within a Computers.
Some devices take a digital feed from the Internet and format that feed into an interface to allow the user to manage it. These are generally known as streamers. Apple TV or similar devices do this while simultaneously handling video content. Dedicated Music Streamers can be high end components by themselves. Streamers may or may not have DACS included with them.
A freestanding DAC allows you to conect other digital sources, such as the CD Player, DVD Players, Computers, Streamers, televisions, Gaming Consoles,etc.
Many CD players now accept digital inputs so that their DAC stage can be used by those sources. In effect they DACs that also spin CDs (or potentially DVDs,Blu Rays).
tbc

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Thank you, richardf - but isn't an ordinary CD player also a "Digital to Analog Converter"? Is there something special about a specific DAC machine that you don't get from a CD player?

[jayne lee wilson]

Thank you, richardf - but isn't an ordinary CD player also a "Digital to Analog Converter"? Is there something special about a specific DAC machine that you don't get from a CD player?

It's simply that a CD Player consists of a transport-plus-dac, i.e, the platter/clamp which spins the disc AND the digital processor both in the one box. Separating these into separate boxes connected with a digital cable is potentially (and very often actually) a sonic benefit...

Connectivity/flexibility is often better too, but nowadays you see CD Players offering USB inputs, filters, wireless streaming pickup etc, to compete with the separate dac designs.... the problem with cramming so much into one chassis is, potentially at least, sonic degradation.
There's often an "upgrade path" offered by many hifi designers, the most common of which is a separate power supply added on to your original purchase. I've heard the benefit very often, and separating out the CD Transport and Dac gains this advantage immediately as each have their own.

[richardfinegold]

Why put your $ in a DAC? Audiophiles argue over this stuff, but in general it is possible to take a cheap transport (such as the DVD player that your supermarket might sell) feed it into a really good DAC, and get a really good sound. The better the transport, the better the sound, but you won't get the same result by buying an uber expensive transport and mating it with a cheap as chips DAC.
Most DACs will "reclock" less than pristine digital feed and clean it up.
DACs also tend to isolate the digital feed from corrupting sources which degrade the sound. The typical PC contains a really cheap poor quality DAC that is not well isolated from the electronic noise that a Computer has to generate to do all the rest of the stuff that a computer has to do.
DACs are more durable than disc spinners. Most CD players are vulnerable to a problem with the transport, such as a laser gone bad, tray malfunction, spinningm malfunction, and others. If the CD transport dies, and you don't have a digital input for that CD player so that it's DAC can't be utilized by another digital source, the machine is worthless. Likewise, Computer Hard Drives are known to crash after a few years. A Quality DAC should last forever, unless a crocodile gets it in it's choppers, and in the price range you have laid out, most have casing that would even survive that...

[richardfinegold]

Thank you, richardf - but isn't an ordinary CD player also a "Digital to Analog Converter"? Is there something special about a specific DAC machine that you don't get from a CD player?

See #49, second sentence

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

See #49, second sentence

<doh> Crossed posts.

[Lordgeous]

Indeed
Even with the "redundancy" a decent RME interface would cost less than many of the things that the "hi-fi buffs" rave about.... if you have a spare let me know

Don't you find the ATC's a bit harsh for extended periods (though Jonty Harrison and others swear by them) ?

I'm currently using ATC SM25s which i think are astonishing, especially for their size. I think they're the first speaker I've had where I never feel I'm listening to loudspeakers! They appear totally natural and transparent, unfatigeuing and certainly never harsh and I'm listening to them in my studio most days, all day. I have to admit to being an ATC fan, since the days, in a previous larger studio, when I had a pair of the huge SCM 200s. Since then, over the years, I've had SCM 100s and SCM 10s and domestically I still have SCM 50s which I must have had since they were first introduced.

Though I work more in the classical field these days the 25s will go REALLY loud when needed, and at those levels they can sound like HUGE studio monitors with an impressive low bass response for their size. Many of my audio colleagues are switching to them and I don't think ATC can keep up with the demand. Of course ANYTHING to do with audio is subjective, and at risk of sounding like an ATC salesperson, I really think they've cracked it with this one. And my clients share my enthusiasm. They won't make poor material sound any better and I now hear things in my mixes that I've never noticed before. At around seven grand a pair they're not cheap, though of course that includes built-in amps, but they're the best improvement to my studio set-up in many years.

[richardfinegold]

I am assuming that those are active speakers. I don't have alot of experience with them, except for some Meridian and Linn set ups. You have hit on one oft he advantages of them, in that they eliminate the requirement for seperate amplification, and so comparing Active speakers versus passive in terms of value needs to correct for that.
The Meridian Speakers that I heard were at the 2015 Chicago High End Show (Axpona) and they sounded awful. They were being used to demo Meridians MQA format, and the set up was in a Hotel Room, with the large speakers smashed into the corners of the room.
Large floor standers need some space behind them, and I've been told that Active Speakers benefit even more from this. The MQA
demo didn't impress in the least, because frankly everything sounded bad in that room

[MrGongGong]

I'm currently using ATC SM25s which i think are astonishing, especially for their size. I think they're the first speaker I've had where I never feel I'm listening to loudspeakers! They appear totally natural and transparent, unfatigeuing and certainly never harsh and I'm listening to them in my studio most days, all day. I have to admit to being an ATC fan, since the days, in a previous larger studio, when I had a pair of the huge SCM 200s. Since then, over the years, I've had SCM 100s and SCM 10s and domestically I still have SCM 50s which I must have had since they were first introduced.

Though I work more in the classical field these days the 25s will go REALLY loud when needed, and at those levels they can sound like HUGE studio monitors with an impressive low bass response for their size. Many of my audio colleagues are switching to them and I don't think ATC can keep up with the demand. Of course ANYTHING to do with audio is subjective, and at risk of sounding like an ATC salesperson, I really think they've cracked it with this one. And my clients share my enthusiasm. They won't make poor material sound any better and I now hear things in my mixes that I've never noticed before. At around seven grand a pair they're not cheap, though of course that includes built-in amps, but they're the best improvement to my studio set-up in may years.

That's very interesting.
I'll try and have a listen to a pair sometime, many electroacoustic composers really rate them and much of the material they make is very demanding indeed (there are several in the BEAST system)
I was doing a mastering session a couple of weeks ago in a well known London establishment that has a B&W Nautilus 5:1 setup as the main speakers in the studio, sounds wonderful but a bit dangerous if you are going to listen on more modest kit at home or in other venues.... so for the equavalent of the "Auratone Cube" that many folks used to use for comparison they have a pair of Genelec 8240A's

[Lordgeous]

All interesting stuff guys. Yes, built-in amps are great, but of course you do then need a decent pre-amp for domestic use. In the studio there's no problem as they are driven from the mixing desk's main output.

Domestically I use a Sumo pre-amp. Not sure if they still exist but they used to be marketed by ATC as ideal for their powered speakers.

in the course of my studio career I've owned Altecs, JBLs, ATCs Urei's, Tannoys, Genelecs (as main monitors) and a fair number of others. Domestically my speakers have ranged from home-made to IMFs, Quad, Spendor, Chartwell ATC and more others than I care to remember! Do others change their speakers so much or is it just me? Hopefully the new ATCs will last me til 'power-down'! I've never owned PMCs but have enjoyed them in mastering suites.

[Beef Oven!]

It's simply that a CD Player consists of a transport-plus-dac, i.e, the platter/clamp which spins the disc AND the digital processor both in the one box. Separating these into separate boxes connected with a digital cable is potentially (and very often actually) a sonic benefit...

Connectivity/flexibility is often better too, but nowadays you see CD Players offering USB inputs, filters, wireless streaming pickup etc, to compete with the separate dac designs.... the problem with cramming so much into one chassis is, potentially at least, sonic degradation.
There's often an "upgrade path" offered by many hifi designers, the most common of which is a separate power supply added on to your original purchase. I've heard the benefit very often, and separating out the CD Transport and Dac gains this advantage immediately as each have their own.

I must say that I'm not convinced by all that seperate box approach.

However, I have my Naim CD player powered by a seperate Naim Hi-Cap independent power supply feeding a pair of Genelec
active speakers.

I really don't know if the Hi-Cap makes any difference.

[jayne lee wilson]

I must say that I'm not convinced by all that seperate box approach.

However, I have my Naim CD player powered by a seperate Naim Hi-Cap independent power supply feeding a pair of Genelec
active speakers.

I really don't know if the Hi-Cap makes any difference.

OK so - take it out. Listen. Put it back in. Listen again.......