Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Stereo DVD or dedicated CD players?

Hello yage,

Hey, when you stick tubes into an analog output section of a digital device, all kinds of frequency response changes may occur. Tubes also generate rather high levels of even-order harmonic distortion, which is quite "musical" sounding, but it unquestionably will alter the linear characteristics, and the sound, of a CD or DVD output section.

I'd be surprised if you didn't hear differences when tube technology is introduced. ..

Regards,

Hi all

I bought a Cambridge Audio D500SE to go with my tube amp driven M3s and despite the great reviews I found this CD player very disappointing. It suffered in every way in every comparison with my 9 year old JVC carousel. The D500SE's bass was loose and blowsy, the mids thin, the highs unremarkable. Instead of shaking it off and staying with the JVC (garage sale value of about $15) I ended up with an Ah! Njoeb Tjoeb 4000 with upgraded Burr Brown 627 OpAmp and tubes for the output section. Well, this little fella set me back a whole bunch of money, and does sound substantially better than the $15 JVC, but it really does provoke some head scratching about dollar per value ratios out there. For that kind of money, I figure it should rub my leg.

I also got a Toshiba SD9200 DVD-A player for my solid state (Onkyo 797 and Denon 2 channel amp for channels 6+7) home theater system. The solid state Toshiba is also beautiful sounding. Hard to compare because of the 7 channel music capability of this system compared with the 2 channel Ah! system.

I suppose if I had to compare, I'd say the tube system (Antique Sound Labs and Ah!) sounds warmer. It is accurate, tight, but more musical. The solid state system is also accurate but has more slam and with the M60 type speakers just sounds 'bigger.'

I also had a Panasonic RP56 DVD player with the Faroudja chip, which I picked up for a bit over $100 at a Circuit City sale, and loved it. Not up to the Toshiba for either music or HT, but excellent nonetheless.

Anyway, for dedicated CD players, I recommend the Ah! (or find a $15 JVC carousel at a garage sale) and for DVD-A, I think the Toshiba is terrific for both music and HT.

I recently found an enlightening article on the tube vs. transistor sound at this website: http://www.milbert.com/new/index.bdc?pg=info. The author links the various orders of harmonic distortion to the perceived tonal qualities reproduced.

Like the article states, it's an interesting psychoacoustical problem. I played piano for seven years and I played on different pianos - grands, uprights, even really old ones that sounded terrible. But a lot of the CD players I've come across always seem to miss the mark when it comes to the reproduction of a piano's sound, even if the pages of Stereophile show graphs that proclaim their flat frequency response.

Is what's "missing" due to the recording? The format? The player? Or my own fuzzy memories of childhood? Probably a bit of all of them...

Alan - by the way, the tube output stage in the Heart is a common-cathode amplifier using two 6922 small-signal tubes. Linearity is achieved with a little negative local feedback (which I've read matches the linearity achieved with solid state). According to the article I referenced in the previous post, the harmonics come into play when the amplifiers are driven into the overload region...

It should rub your leg?
And it cost how much?

That's just too funny.

My fiance has a cousin that used to play with a well known Canandian band. He has done a fair bit of recording with them. The next time i talk to him i will try to remember to ask his opinion about the sounds of their recorded work compared to playback on their home stereos and such.
I'm sure he may report a very similar thing that you have regarding 'missing' elements.

In fact, if i remember correctly, Ian or Amie mentioned not too long ago about a band from Toronto? that was going to do some recording and listening testing with Axiom to look at this subject.
If i could only find that post...
ya, here it is:
link to post