Crystal Disc US$1600 was played with Genesis Speaker

[andymodern]

@Myles: That does not jive with my memory of the early digital recording process but whatever. The big limitations were the ADCs, then the DACs...

Regarding the plots, where is the signal being probed? Output of the optical receiver (doubtful, too clean), after the detector and EQ, ??? Are they claiming the large amplitude increase is due to the better CD construction? The eye diagrams are not normal single- or two-UI spans so it is hard to see what to get out of them. From what I can tell looking at fuzzy captures on my notebook there is very little difference in the eye patterns (save the amplitude).

edit: Tom jumped in ahead of me, slow typer...

The plotted diagram is used more likely to visualize the result of good sounding from a Crystal Disc.

When you look at the manufacturing process, it is totally different from making a Crystal Disc than a conventional CD. A conventional CD (CD) is just like a plastic cup which is pressed thru a injection molding process in a molding machine while the Crystal Disc (Crystal) is made thru the Photo Polymerization process (2P process). The process of making Crystal is far more complicated than of CD.

Pressing a conventional CD:
- require High Temperature, High Pressure to inject the poly-carbonate
- then cool down the CD instantly
--> resulting in
- quick change of temperature makes the shape of digital pit not perfect
- poly-carbonate cannot fill up the digital pit of the metal stamper even under extremely high pressure

Making a Crystal Disc
- Glass plate from glass factory must be refined manually in Memory-Tech
- undergo the Photo Polymerization process which forms the data layer
~ apply special kind of liquid polymer on the metal stamper and the glass
~ because the liquid polymer is fluid, it fills up the digital pits of the metal stamper easily and perfectly
~ under the exposure of ultra-light, the polymer becomes hard and forms perfect data layer with perfect digital pits.
- then 24K gold plating process to produce the reflective layer
--> resulting in
- use of refined glass substrate can almost eilminate the bi-refringence effect
- when no change of temperature occurs, perfect shape of pits are formed
- Glass substrate is hardly influenced by the variation of temperature and humidity
----> After all, Crystal Disc can provide much better and accurate digital data being read and produce much less jitter.
----> the maximum capacity of a Crystal Disc production in Memory-Tech is only 70 discs each day.


The liquid polymer is being applied on the metal stamper:


The glass substrate was placed onto the metal stamper and ready to be spun in high speed:


After 24K Gold plating process:


From left: Me, father of HQCD & Crystal Disc, Representative from Memory-Tech in China

 

[GaryProtein]

. . . . And it is strange that SACD is not very popular in Hong Kong, Taiwan and China. Audiophiles here still like normal CD/HQCD/SHM-CD which are considered even better when the recording is mastered using XRCD or K2HD or LPCD.

That's interesting! Why is that?

The sound quality of the master is more important than whether the disk is a CD or SACD.

Quality sound in, quality sound out, garbage in, garbage out.

I do find it interesting that on hybrid CD-SACD disks that the CD portion is very slightly brighter than the SACD. Because I never heard the master on my system in my room, I can't say which is correct and which isn't. It seems that recordings of performances on SACD are made with more care in production because the SACD is more expensive and if it didn't sound decent, there would be more complaints than if the disk was an inexpensive CD.

 

[andymodern]

The sound quality of the master is more important than whether the disk is a CD or SACD.

Quality sound in, quality sound out, garbage in, garbage out.

I do find it interesting that on hybrid CD-SACD disks that the CD portion is very slightly brighter than the SACD. Because I never heard the master on my system in my room, I can't say which is correct and which isn't. It seems that recordings of performances on SACD are made with more care in production because the SACD is more expensive and if it didn't sound decent, there would be more complaints than if the disk was an inexpensive CD.

Japanese SACD factory only makes single-layer SACD and European makes only hybrid SACD. You know why? I believe that Japanese wants more superior sound and forget about compatiblity while European thinks compatiblity is more important!

 

[NorthStar]

Last year I produced a sampler in HQCDII (HQCDII was launched in Hong Kong last year by Memory-Tech and us. This title was the 1st HQCDII in the world.) I made a few test-pressing with and without printing on the CD surface. I found the one without printing could provide more superior sound. I think this explain why the CD layer of hybrid SACD doesn't sound as good as a conventional CD because the SACD layer on top of CD layer affects the reflection of the laser light in a way that more errors occur.

It goes without saying that this is the very first time ever that I'm reading this.

 

[NorthStar]

...

When you look at the manufacturing process, it is totally different from making a Crystal Disc than a conventional CD. A conventional CD (CD) is just like a plastic cup which is pressed thru a injection molding process in a molding machine while the Crystal Disc (Crystal) is made thru the Photo Polymerization process (2P process). The process of making Crystal is far more complicated than of CD.

Pressing a conventional CD:
- require High Temperature, High Pressure to inject the poly-carbonate
- then cool down the CD instantly
--> resulting in
- quick change of temperature makes the shape of digital pit not perfect
- poly-carbonate cannot fill up the digital pit of the metal stamper even under extremely high pressure

Making a Crystal Disc
- Glass plate from glass factory must be refined manually in Memory-Tech
- undergo the Photo Polymerization process which forms the data layer
~ apply special kind of liquid polymer on the metal stamper and the glass
~ because the liquid polymer is fluid, it fills up the digital pits of the metal stamper easily and perfectly
~ under the exposure of ultra-light, the polymer becomes hard and forms perfect data layer with perfect digital pits.
- then 24K gold plating process to produce the reflective layer
--> resulting in
- use of refined glass substrate can almost eilminate the bi-refringence effect
- when no change of temperature occurs, perfect shape of pits are formed
- Glass substrate is hardly influenced by the variation of temperature and humidity
----> After all, Crystal Disc can provide much better and accurate digital data being read and produce much less jitter.
----> the maximum capacity of a Crystal Disc production in Memory-Tech is only 70 discs each day.

Most interesting and educational.

 

[NorthStar]

Japanese SACD factory only makes single-layer SACD and European makes only hybrid SACD. You know why?
I believe that Japanese wants more superior sound and forget about compatibility while European thinks compatibility is more important!

That makes total sense. ...Better Quality Sound over Compatibility.
...The Japanese sounds superior indeed over the European (German, British, French, Italian, ...Australian, Canadian, American, and all in between).

 

[andymodern]

Explain to me how the raw digital data stored on a $1600 disc is any different than the raw data stored on a $10 disc. One could argue that the $1600 disc somehow allows a transport to extract this data from a player with lower error rates, but an error corrected copy of this data on a harddrive is bit for bit the same information. Reading the discs with a memory player there should also be absolutely zero difference between what the player loads into memory.

Digital reading not always the same in terms of my own listening experience!

I did several experiments on storing my DSD digital recording (original recording files) on different harddrives. I found they sound different. One of the harddrives (internal) produced even unacceptable sound. You will also get differnet sound when you try different digital cables on a same harddrive.

None of ripped wav files (ripped in my computer system) sound as good as the original CD.

All are digital transfer. Theoretically they all should sound the same, but i tell you it is not true! Why? Someone told it was all about digital jitter from the computer clock!

 

[Steve Williams]

The following description is provided by Memory-Tech in Japan to tell us what Crystal Disc is:
Crystal disc, a revolutionary Compact Disc using glass substrate, this new technology allows sound reproduction at a level previously unknown and is as close to the master sound source as cutting edge technology allows.

This statement would lead me to believe that this format ( a redbook variant) brings us closer to the master than any other format

If indeed this is the case are we all deluding ourselves with the use of tape, DSD, hirez digital files

 

[edorr]

This statement would lead me to believe that this format ( a redbook variant) brings us closer to the master than any other format

If indeed this is the case are we all deluding ourselves with the use of tape, DSD, hirez digital files

We should also immediately stop ripping files to harddrive and revert back to spinning discs.

 

[andymodern]

This statement would lead me to believe that this format ( a redbook variant) brings us closer to the master than any other format

If indeed this is the case are we all deluding ourselves with the use of tape, DSD, hirez digital files

HiRez file is certainly a trend to follow. But it goes very slow in Asia, especially in Hong Kong, Taiwan and China. Record companies here are not willing to open their recording sources to the public market as long as they can't find a revenue earning model to justify their production cost.

 

[NorthStar]

Digital reading not always the same in terms of my own listening experience!

I did several experiments on storing my DSD digital recording (original recording files) on different harddrives. I found they sound different. One of the harddrives (internal) produced even unacceptable sound. You will also get differnet sound when you try different digital cables on a same harddrive.

None of ripped wav files (ripped in my computer system) sound as good as the original CD.

All are digital transfer. Theoretically they all should sound the same, but i tell you it is not true!
Why? Someone told it was all about digital jitter from the computer clock!

I always have been under that very strong belief!

P.S. Thx for adding those pictures on the previous page.

 

[mojave]

There was a recent thread here asking about USB cables. There were many comments including "depends on how much you want to spend," "best one I've tried so far," "trying a cable in your system is important," or "I tried four different cables in my system and chose x." Any USB cable I use for an external hard drive will always transfer the bits exactly identical unless the cable is damaged. I can't figure out how a USB cable or a CD are any different when both are used for storing or transporting digital data. What I'm really getting at is that I don't understand the negative tone in this thread when many posting seem to think that there are a great number of things in a system including cables that can affect the digital signal.

I guess Tim summarized it best:

Glad to see we've found a BS meter tripping point for some of our more faithful members.

Tim

 

[audioguy]

None of ripped wav files (ripped in my computer system) sound as good as the original CD.

I have had the exact opposite experience (and we did the test blind). The transport used was the top of the line ($70K) dCS as well as the rest of the dCS stack. The server was connected to the dCS DAC. EVERY time, we would pick the server as the better sounding source (there were two of us who participated in this test). I did the same test on a lower end system with a lower end DAC and got identical results. The server we used was the Sound Science Music Vault.

YMMV.

 

[still-one]

We should also immediately stop ripping files to harddrive and revert back to spinning discs.

I am too lazy to spin discs most of the time. There isn't enough difference between the two playback methods to worry about which is better.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Japanese SACD factory only makes single-layer SACD and European makes only hybrid SACD. You know why? I believe that Japanese wants more superior sound and forget about compatiblity while European thinks compatiblity is more important!

i've compared original source master dsd files to ripped SACD's and the differences are very marginal....there are differences but not significant. the same with redbook masters and ripped CD's. with top level digital players and dacs.

i'll agree completely that redbook can sound wonderful with specific recordings, really, really good. but then hear a similar level hirez PCM, similar level dsd, top flight vinyl or top level tape and the hirerarchy stays in line.

at the end of the day, the formats which contain the most information and muck with the signal the least sound the best.

nothing to see here....move along....

 

[NorthStar]

I am to lazy to spin discs most of the time. There isn't enough difference between the two playback methods to worry about which is better.

Or is it a question of Practicality (ease) over Sound Quality, Jim?

 

[NorthStar]

i've compared original source master dsd files to ripped SACD's and the differences are very marginal....there are differences but not significant. the same with redbook masters and ripped CD's. with top level digital players and dacs.

i'll agree completely that redbook can sound wonderful with specific recordings, really, really good. but then hear a similar level hirez PCM, similar level dsd, top flight vinyl or top level tape and the hirerarchy stays in line.

nothing to see here....move along....

Where to Mike?

 

[microstrip]

Last year I produced a sampler in HQCDII (HQCDII was launched in Hong Kong last year by Memory-Tech and us. This title was the 1st HQCDII in the world.) I made a few test-pressing with and without printing on the CD surface. I found the one without printing could provide more superior sound. I think this explain why the CD layer of hybrid SACD doesn't sound as good as a conventional CD because the SACD layer on top of CD layer affects the reflection of the laser light in a way that more errors occur.

It is known that some CD players have problems playing hybrid SACDs. On some cases skipping hybrids could be a signal that the time to replace the laser was arriving, although they would play normal CDs perfectly. Although I do not own a SACD player I have got many hybrids, as Aliavox, the Jordi Saval label, issues most of their recent recordings in hybrid SACD/CD. They are much more sensitive to fingerprints then normal CDs.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Where to Mike?

back to whatever else you were doing.......before you considered that redbook just might be the magic potion.

it's not. regardless of how it's delivered.

 

[Bruce B]

i've compared original source master dsd files to ripped SACD's and the differences are very marginal....there are differences but not significant. the same with redbook masters and ripped CD's. with top level digital players and dacs.

i'll agree completely that redbook can sound wonderful with specific recordings, really, really good. but then hear a similar level hirez PCM, similar level dsd, top flight vinyl or top level tape and the hirerarchy stays in line.

at the end of the day, the formats which contain the most information and muck with the signal the least sound the best.

nothing to see here....move along....

+1.. agree with Mike. Get the source files and don't think any more about it. You can put the files on anything you want.... SSD, Green Tune, SD, DVD or anything. The plant starts with the source files anyway.