Advice re front end please

You could try the SL DIN - DIN on your CDS2 too.

C.

Trev, sorry but how many CD's is your collection?

Hi Erich

I have about 500 so far, but the CDS2 is the weak link in the system. I need a better quality front end to get me back into buying music again.

I could put a 555dr onto the cds2, which I guess would make a vast difference? Then tackle the NDS with twin 555dr's later!!

Thanks

Trev

impy posted:

Hi Erich

I have about 500 so far, but the CDS2 is the weak link in the system. I need a better quality front end to get me back into buying music again.

I could put a 555dr onto the cds2, which I guess would make a vast difference? Then tackle the NDS with twin 555dr's later!!

Thanks

Trev

Or, you could go for a good streamer, and set about ripping your CD collection, eventually abandoning CD playing. Streaming has the capability to give better sound quality than CD: not just because of the potential of higher resolution files (though the quality of higher resolution files isn't always better, as it seems many are mastered differently), but because it does not rely on a mechanical device running real-time, so doesn't need the error correction circuitry to interpolate the sound in any gaps, and nothing to wear and go out of alignment or fail in time.

My own switch to streaming three years ago followed a CD player reaching end of life, when to me it seemed like streaming was the future, and without the disadvantages mentioned above, so I ripped all my CDs (I had previously ripped my LPs and made into CDs, but had retained the files on a hard disk as well so half my music collection was ready for streaming). My path was NSA325 NAS  plus firstly ND5XS  then ND5XS+XP5XS then ND5XS+Hugo Then changed NAS to Mac Mini running Serviio UPnP server (with ND5XS+Hugo) then Mac Mini running Audirvana, through Gustard U12 into Hugo. All that in 2 years! If I'd known what I do now I could have saved myself a bit of cash... MM/Audiv is good enough for Chord Dave to reveal more than the Hugo. But that does not mean that any of these combinations is better than NDS+XPS as I haven't compared.

Thanks Innocent

I am not a tweaker; at my age I just want to plug and play with consistent sound quality that engages me.

There is probably a lot to be said about Naim synergy, so the first place to start will probably be here. But I need to look at other possibilities, especially DAVE, as Tony M uses this in his active DBL system.

Thanks

Trev

I'm no tweaker either, just had to find the right thing after the change to streaming, nothing in my system having changed for many years before that...

IIRC TonyM uses the Dave's predecessor, QBD76 (still available and cheaper), and in his system prefers it to Dave. He feeds it from a Melco music store and renderer: much like the Mac Min/Audirvana, but turnkey on purchase. I had a brief comparison through Dave of the entry lavel Melco and my MM setup, and there was no obvious difference. That is contrary to Tony's assessment through the QBD, though best hypothesis is better RF rejection by Dave making that aspect of the sources irrelevant, whereas with QBD the lesser filtering from MM compared to inbuilt in Melco's output might have caused the MM to degrade the sound caompared to Melco (n.b. our respective MM setups were different, including the approach to isolation).

If you had more CDs I would have recommended to get a better CDP first. But To rip 500 CDs is not a big deal, so go with a streaming kit.

Clearly if you have a 500 system you deserve a good "digital solution".

Take your time to audition the best you can afford. In the meanwhile you can get a decent dac  and use a MAC mini, book pro or air to rip CDs, store Hires albums and replay them using Audirvana 2+. That way you can start very soon to explore and understand the diffenrent options in terms of formats, sites to buy HR files, streaming services, etc.