Any HI-FI Buffs on here ?? I need some advice.

[phil_hg_uk]

Long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, I downloaded Cool Edit, since bought up by Adobe and re-packaged as Audition, to transfer my records to digital. It had a snap, crackle and pop filter, which was excellent. The whole process was so tortuous though I gave up and just re-bought them on CD

I have re-bought a lot on CD. I started buying CD's from ebay & amazon last year instead of MP3, its amazing how cheap they are 2nd hand I averaged £2.89 per album last year on over 100 of them including P&P thats cheaper than buying them on MP3.

 

[raleighnut]

I bet expensive cables vs. cheap cables is the 'helmet' debate of the home audio forums.

According my mate, a sound recordist, quality cables make all the difference.
According to my brother, an electronics engineer... it's all marketing bull.

All i know is, my gold plated OFC 'quality' cables sound exactly the same as cables i knocked up myself using doorbell wire and badly soldered phono plugs from Tandy.

QUAD say pretty much the same but I feel the slightly better quality do make a difference but I'm not spending 5 1/2 Grand (each) on cabling.

 

[Profpointy]

I can. There isn't.

Seriously - tell me how one lossless medium can sound different to another lossless medium through the same equipment? It's exactly the same digital signal being converted to an analogue output, some gain applied and then dumped through the speakers.

It's just not possible.

The only thing I can think of is that you are comparing something like a streamed MP3 to a CD?

Another pitfall of such comparisons is if one is very slightly louder than the other. They sound the same volume, yet the imperceptably louder one sounds perceptably better.

Wireless World did some carefully controlled blind listening tests between valve and transistor amps in the early '80s and differences were there till they matched levels very carefully and no one could then tell the difference (specifically they heard a difference betwee a & b about as often as between a & a).

Not to say that good hifi isn't better than bad (up to a point).

 

[Grant Fondo]

I may go for an upgrade soon, speakers are weak link , and I miss the Dynaudio's I used to have, proper lively!

 

[raleighnut]

QUAD did a similar thing with a blind listening test between their QUAD 11 (valve) 303 (conventional class B) and 405 (current dumping) amplifier and no-one could tell the difference.

 

[Profpointy]

I can. There isn't.

Seriously - tell me how one lossless medium can sound different to another lossless medium through the same equipment? It's exactly the same digital signal being converted to an analogue output, some gain applied and then dumped through the speakers.

It's just not possible.

The only thing I can think of is that you are comparing something like a streamed MP3 to a CD?

I suspect you may both be right. Spokey's description is quite clealry right - after all, "ye canne break the laws of physics" as the Great Man said.

Yet the subtle word "streamed" is stuck in Derriks post. That could cover a multitude of sins such as the mentioned MP3 - an audibly inferior format to CD, and if "streamed" over wifi or the internet then there could be all sorts of delays and glitches.

CD format digitally streamed from a CD player to a DAC from a CD drive versus CD format streamed from a hard disc to the same DAC. These will be identical unless one or other unit is faulty in some way

 

[SpokeyDokey]

I suspect you may both be right. Spokey's description is quite clealry right - after all, "ye canne break the laws of physics" as the Great Man said.

Yet the subtle word "streamed" is stuck in Derriks post. That could cover a multitude of sins such as the mentioned MP3 - an audibly inferior format to CD, and if "streamed" over wifi or the internet then there could be all sorts of delays and glitches.

CD format digitally streamed from a CD player to a DAC from a CD drive versus CD format streamed from a hard disc to the same DAC. These will be identical unless one or other unit is faulty in some way

I agree totally with you.

It would appear that streaming is often synonymous with MP3 due to the popularity of the obvious music format of choice for the younger generation.

Whereas streaming is simply the non-cable method of getting some 'bits' from A to B and therein lies the confusion which is what you allude to.

I'm sold on streaming as long as the format is lossless.

I tend to buy CD's and rip to FLAC but of late I have purchased some lossless downloads from this very good outfit.

http://www.qobuz.com/ie-en/discover

 

[swee'pea99]

You can make your own liquid for a million times less.

Yeah. And believe me it took a lot of reading to persuade me to part with £30 for a wee bottle of holy water, but I don't regret it. I actually use both. In fact, I use three. Distilled water + isopropyl alcohol in a 5/1 mix; then the jungle juice; then distilled water with a couple of drops of rinse-aid. The way I look at it, in the great scheme of (hi-fi) things, £30 is a worthwhile investment, if it works. And a) a lot of people seem to think so, and b) I think I agree with them. Put it this way, if I ever ran out, I'd get more.

 

[raleighnut]

Yeah. And believe me it took a lot of reading to persuade me to part with £30 for a wee bottle of holy water, but I don't regret it. I actually use both. In fact, I use three. Distilled water + isopropyl alcohol in a 5/1 mix; then the jungle juice; then distilled water with a couple of drops of rinse-aid. The way I look at it, in the great scheme of (hi-fi) things, £30 is a worthwhile investment, if it works. And a) a lot of people seem to think so, and b) I think I agree with them. Put it this way, if I ever ran out, I'd get more.

I use a Carbon Fibre Filament brush, seems to get any dust off.

 

[Grant Fondo]

I use a Carbon Fibre Filament brush, seems to get any dust off.

Can you still get these as I lost mine?

 

[raleighnut]

Can you still get these as I lost mine?

Yep, loads of em about

http://www.google.co.uk/aclk?sa=L&a...=http://www.vickershifi.com/Products/APJBrush

Best thing I ever bought, I've had mine for over 30yrs

 

[swee'pea99]

I use a Carbon Fibre Filament brush, seems to get any dust off.

Thing is, I'm buying records off ebay, and they come in a wide variety of conditions. Some come bearing rather more than dust...

 

[raleighnut]

Thing is, I'm buying records off ebay, and they come in a wide variety of conditions. Some come bearing rather more than dust...

I've bought a few 2nd hand records, I know what you mean.

 

[raleighnut]

The only snag with streaming is if you lose the device or it breaks then the content is lost, I know that some 'providers' will have your 'account' on their servers but nothing beats a 'hard copy'
It's a bit like Vinyl, once dismissed as 'old hat' with many discarding both their players and all those Records they had collected only for 20yrs later it to make a big comeback and prices to rocket both for the players and the discs.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

The only snag with streaming is if you lose the device or it breaks then the content is lost, I know that some 'providers' will have your 'account' on their servers but nothing beats a 'hard copy'
It's a bit like Vinyl, once dismissed as 'old hat' with many discarding both their players and all those Records they had collected only for 20yrs later it to make a big comeback and prices to rocket both for the players and the discs.

I stream my music from one of these:

https://www.synology.com/en-global/products/DS216play

Hard to lose it!

All files backed up to cloud based storage as well.