Digital that sounds like analog

opus111

Banned
Feb 10, 2012
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Hangzhou, China
Disc recommendation

Just throw in a quick plug for this disc I'm listening to right now - really amazing depth of soundstage and explosive dynamics and I don't even have this remastered edition. Mine is just out of my Decca boxed set of 50. A go-to disc exploring the limits of any system I reckon :)

http://www.amazon.com/Romantic-Russ...id=1354861668&sr=1-1&keywords=romantic+russia

Holy crap! - couldn't have put it better myself.
 

jkeny

Industry Expert, Member Sponsor
Feb 9, 2012
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Ireland
Just throw in a quick plug for this disc I'm listening to right now - really amazing depth of soundstage and explosive dynamics and I don't even have this remastered edition. Mine is just out of my Decca boxed set of 50. A go-to disc exploring the limits of any system I reckon :)

http://www.amazon.com/Romantic-Russ...id=1354861668&sr=1-1&keywords=romantic+russia

Holy crap! - couldn't have put it better myself.

Don't know if this is using D-S A/D (probably) but the mastering technique used is called K2HD - seemingly a descendent of XRCD mastering techniques http://www.dagogo.com/View-Article.asp?hArticle=39

Edit: I see a WBF member referenced in that article!
 

TBone

New Member
Nov 15, 2012
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I'm not one of those who likes the sound of LP - I don't have any, sold off years ago. When CD came out I didn't notice the noise modulation imperfections I notice now, but I did love the improvement it gave me on piano over LP. I found LP just couldn't do the dynamics of piano well enough. LP lovers bear in mind my TT wasn't an expensive one (Rega Planar 3). The best piano LP I ever owned in terms of SQ was a Nimbus direct-to-disk of Bernard Roberts playing the Diabelli Variations, however my TT/arm/cartridge could not track this without gross distortion. So I really appreciated CD's freedom from hash on piano.

Well, the original P3 had some major issues with speed instability ... the root cause was it's very noisy motor which needed to be hung on a belt in order to try and achieve "some" form of isolation. This allowed the motor/pulley to move independent of the platter on a constant basis ... the result was major timing issues ... easily heard on piano.

Therefore, one cannot condemn vinyls so called "inability to reproduce piano" based on one very flawed machine.

Funny, for a long period of time, I thought that nearly all digital players reproduce piano poorly.

tb1
 

Bruce B

WBF Founding Member, Pro Audio Production Member
Apr 25, 2010
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They use dCS now? They started out with Bob Adams' design which was originally dbx and made a big song and dance about how its low level linearity performance was better than multibit in those days (it was too, no kidding). That was around 1990 or so - when did they change?

Chesky is now using the MSB Tech Studio Platinum A/D but Sterling is still using the old dCS converters.
 

Bruce B

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Apr 25, 2010
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LL21

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Dec 26, 2010
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I'm not claiming that its performance will beat your Zanden Lloyd, as the TDA1541A is a seriously tough act to follow and I'm using CMOS DAC chips with all kinds of glitching. But I do know my DAC will be at least 20dB cheaper.:cool:

Look forward to hearing it just the same!!! BTW, have you heard of the Aletheia DAC? Supposedly TDA1543 NOS DAC. They show some of the insides in a HiFi critic Review which is online from their website. Any thoughts? http://aletheia-audio.com/?page_id=11
 

jkeny

Industry Expert, Member Sponsor
Feb 9, 2012
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Look forward to hearing it just the same!!! BTW, have you heard of the Aletheia DAC? Supposedly TDA1543 NOS DAC. They show some of the insides in a HiFi critic Review which is online from their website. Any thoughts? http://aletheia-audio.com/?page_id=11

I like their two major design philosophy points mentioned in the PDF:
• Time domain thinking, rather than frequency domain thinking.
• The minimization of unwanted RFI/EMI and microphony effects.

Opus11 may be able to analyse if they reach full realisation of these two points?

Edit: They also leave out the known issues with NOS - the HF roll-off, & alias images. I also spluttered when I read the price 11,500GBP I might hazard a guess that Opus's final product may be somewhat cheaper!
 

LL21

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Dec 26, 2010
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I like their two major design philosophy points mentioned in the PDF:
• Time domain thinking, rather than frequency domain thinking.
• The minimization of unwanted RFI/EMI and microphony effects.

Opus11 may be able to analyse if they reach full realisation of these two points?

Edit: They also leave out the known issues with NOS - the HF roll-off, & alias images. I also spluttered when I read the price 11,500GBP :)

;)! No kidding! The interesting thing is...Vertex AQ...is originally an isolation/RFI/EMI manufacturer...they then appear to have decided to make a DAC...by using a TDA1543 NOS...as Opus111 would say, a good start...and then they seem to have exectued on where they are strong...implementation thru isolation, shielding, power supplies, etc.

Opus111?
 

jkeny

Industry Expert, Member Sponsor
Feb 9, 2012
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;)! No kidding! The interesting thing is...Vertex AQ...is originally an isolation/RFI/EMI manufacturer...they then appear to have decided to make a DAC...by using a TDA1543 NOS...as Opus111 would say, a good start...and then they seem to have exectued on where they are strong...implementation thru isolation, shielding, power supplies, etc.

Opus111?

Sure, I just don't know if they have really dug into the RFI/EMI issues & came up with innovative solutions. It seems to me that they have used EMI shielding. You can buy EMI absorption sheets fairly cheaply yourself. They have used cotton wrap as absorption technique :). They have also bought in Paul Hynes PS modules. I'm not sure what engineering the 11,500 price gets you?
 

LL21

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Sure, I just don't know if they have really dug into the RFI/EMI issues & came up with innovative solutions. It seems to me that they have used EMI shielding. You can buy EMI absorption sheets fairly cheaply yourself. They have used cotton wrap as absorption technique :). They have also bought in Paul Hynes PS modules. I'm not sure what engineering the 11,500 price gets you?

Yes, will be interesting to get Opus111's technical assessment. As for price, 'suppose its what the market will bear. And if it does sound world-class and can compete with Emm, Meridian 808.3i, Esoteric D02, DCS, etc then i suppose it might then sell well.
 

opus111

Banned
Feb 10, 2012
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Hangzhou, China
Therefore, one cannot condemn vinyls so called "inability to reproduce piano" based on one very flawed machine.

Indeed not, which was why I was careful to point out the particular details of my own experience, so that others wouldn't make the mistake of doing that. 'Inability to reproduce piano' being entirely a notion of your own devising. Do I detect defensiveness here perchance? ;)
 

LL21

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Dec 26, 2010
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I wouldn't know because I just have the plain vanilla version. Which is almost certainly a pirate 'remaster' anyway, this being China :D

Hi Opus, fwiw, i have compared FIM/LIM remasterings vs. original, Analogue Productions remasters...and in all cases, i have preferred FIM/LIM. And to be fair, i love the Analogue Productions remasters. they are stunning. On Oscar Peterson We Get Requests, i think both are sensational (FIM and Analogue Productions)...but I tend to play the FIM version more often. Same goes for Canatate Domino, and a number of others i have compared side by side over the years. When they come up second hand, and the music is something i wish to listen to...i get it on Amazon.
 

opus111

Banned
Feb 10, 2012
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Hangzhou, China
Look forward to hearing it just the same!!! BTW, have you heard of the Aletheia DAC? Supposedly TDA1543 NOS DAC. They show some of the insides in a HiFi critic Review which is online from their website. Any thoughts? http://aletheia-audio.com/?page_id=11

Oooh, don't get me started :D Looks like an almost total ****-take to me. Eleven grand for what's essentially a hobbyist DAC chip (the TDA1543 having some of the worst measurements of any DAC I know of, sounds pretty good though for the money even though coloured). The irony is sweet that a box using one of the most coloured DACs I know of should be called 'truth' (that's the English translation of the Greek word 'aletheia'). Paul Messenger in the review displays his ignorance of DAC architecture by calling it 'resistor ladder'. How much more would you like? :eek:
 

Bruce B

WBF Founding Member, Pro Audio Production Member
Apr 25, 2010
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Hi Opus, fwiw, i have compared FIM/LIM remasterings vs. original, Analogue Productions remasters...and in all cases, i have preferred FIM/LIM. And to be fair, i love the Analogue Productions remasters. they are stunning. On Oscar Peterson We Get Requests, i think both are sensational (FIM and Analogue Productions)...but I tend to play the FIM version more often. Same goes for Canatate Domino, and a number of others i have compared side by side over the years. When they come up second hand, and the music is something i wish to listen to...i get it on Amazon.

All the titles you mentioned are great "remasters".
 

opus111

Banned
Feb 10, 2012
1,286
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0
Hangzhou, China
I like their two major design philosophy points mentioned in the PDF:
• Time domain thinking, rather than frequency domain thinking.
• The minimization of unwanted RFI/EMI and microphony effects.

Opus11 may be able to analyse if they reach full realisation of these two points?

Leaving out any kind of imaging filter plays havoc with the time domain response too - it means the output is a series of steps rather than a smooth signal. Which I take it is the reason PM says 'the sound could become a little uncomfortable and aggressive if the volume was turned up high'. This DAC is incontinent, the results you get are going to depend strongly on how well your preamp and poweramp cope with step functions and image (>22kHz) frequencies.

Edit: They also leave out the known issues with NOS - the HF roll-off, & alias images. I also spluttered when I read the price 11,500GBP I might hazard a guess that Opus's final product may be somewhat cheaper!

The final price of the product based on my DAC will be up to the vendor, but yeah the parts price will be substantially cheaper (say -30dB) than the selling price of this beastie.
 
Last edited:

LL21

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Dec 26, 2010
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Oooh, don't get me started :D Looks like an almost total ****-take to me. Eleven grand for what's essentially a hobbyist DAC chip (the TDA1543 having some of the worst measurements of any DAC I know of, sounds pretty good though for the money even though coloured). The irony is sweet that a box using one of the most coloured DACs I know of should be called 'truth' (that's the English translation of the Greek word 'aletheia'). Paul Messenger in the review displays his ignorance of DAC architecture by calling it 'resistor ladder'. How much more would you like? :eek:

Oooofff...talk about dead on arrival! It did make me think when isolation/shielding guys started to enter the digital world. nevertheless, always curious to hear, though not inclined to chase.
 

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