ajvare

I found this site (http://www.colorfly.eu/product_index.html) that seems to indicate that there is a portable palyer with a real DAC in it and the ability to play files up to 24/192. Whiel I have digitized 100+ albums at 24/96 and bought a lot of high rez downloads I'm probably doing 75% of my listening on my iPhone, obviusly the weak link in the chain. Could this be the way to get more out of my portable listening? Would appreacite any feedback on this or other "high end" portable players. Now that I have seen this I'm all reved up to buy it or something like it. Thanks.

George, I think the Ensemble will do 24/192 while the Duet tops out at 24/96, wondering about the value of more Hz? How do you rate the AD/DA quality of the Apogee stuff vs high end audiophile brands? Thanks.

I was preparing a detailed post on my LP ripping project and weak links in the chain from LP to computer playback (see below) but came up with a more immediate question: With so many DACs out there and many of them coming from small companies that I have never heard of I'm wondering if we would't do as well or better using pro audio gear. I started thinking about this as I was looking at audio interfaces for recording; most of them play back and it seems logical that if I rip an LP with a certain A/D box that the same box should do a good job going D/A as well. I bought an Apogee Duet from Sweetwater (no plugging but they seems like a good pro audio source) and have been very happy with the results so far. I visited my local pro music store (Bananas at Large in San Rafael CA) and they made a strong argument for pro gear. They say they sell all manner of recording gear to pro studios, including AD/DA boxes and that the ones they sell (Pre-Sonus, RME, Apogee, ...) are validated by the people making the recordings and should get a more through shake out as products than consumer stuff. Depending on what you buy it seems that pro stuff is cheaper too. So: is it possible to get a DAC (that is also a AD/DA box) form a pro audio source that is as good or better than a Berkeley Alpha or Weiss et al? Thanks (comments on the recording screed below welcome as well). ------------------ LP Ripping Project Analog 1) Rega Planar 25 w/Stock Tonearm 2) Dynavector 10x5 High Output Moving Coil 3) Stock Interconnects to Phono Preamp 4) Moon LP3 Phono Preamp 5) Medium quality Audioquest Interconnects to Duet Digital 6) Apogee Duet (XLR line-in, set to “XLR Mic” for adjustable gain) a. Duet is 24bit/96Hz max b. Connects to Mac over Firewire 400 7) iMac a. 3.06 GhHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB SDRAM b. OSX v. 10.6.5 8) Peak LE v. 6.2.0 a. Records 24bit/96Hz AIFF files (need to upgrade to do other formats) b. I do very little editing in Peak, some times increase gain a bit 9) Click Repair v3.3.1 (great tool) Playback 10) From the iMac – not the critical listening location a. Duet back out to an Old NAD 3020 b. B&W Book shelf 11) Using AirPlay over the Airport – Main listening area for now a. Airport to DAC with Toslink, decent quality cable (Note: As some point I’ll get a Mac Mini or other server with its own hard drive and copy of the library to feed the DAC and playback directly. Using Airplay I understand that everything gets down sampled to 16bits/44.1 Hz) b. Cambridge DAC Magic, RCA to Creek with high quality Audioquest cables c. Creek 4330SE d. Vienna Acoustics Mozart speakers Questions 1) Without respect to playback, where is the weakest link in the analog to digital file chain? I’m ripping my 500+ albums slowly and don’t want to regret a poor choice later. 2) Is there much to be gained from upgrading to 24bit/192Hz? a. Cost could be high for new A/D, D/A, Recording S/W (Peak Pro is $500), etc. b. Thoughts on using a Professional DAC for both the recording now and later move it to the main kit for playback? (Something like the Apogee Ensemble [http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Ensemble/ ] or the RME Babayface [http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Babyface/ ] 3) While not too worried about storage this means a much bigger library when done (most of the CDs are in AIFF right now)

Rick, Thanks, its interesting to hear that people in the business have a strong feeling about the quality of higher rez. I'd imagine they deal with the price/quality issue a bit in their work. Here and elsewhere I see total different views on the quality of 96hz vs. 192hz (or rate close to it). Not sure I can hear the difference and have not had an opportunity to do an A/B. However, a closely related question is the Quality/Price ratio. I'm willing to believe that there is a big step up from CD quality with higher rez files (e.g., 16 to 24 bit) and a sample rate that as at least double. I think I have heard the difference, even on my modest kit. To take the next step and go to 192hz seems to be expensive however. For me that means ripping vinyl with a more expensive A/D, getting a good DAC (DAC Magic won't go there), and then worrying that the analog part of the system is up to the DAC level (BTW, I have a Creek Destiny Amp and Vienna Acoustic Speakers). I have always been a big advocate of building the whole chain to the same standard so that no money is wasted on quality that doesn't come out of the speaker but that also means there are a lot of pieces to be analyzed and possibly replaced (e.g., am I entering the world of worrying about the power supply for the amp, the spending $$$ on interconnects and speaker wire, et al). Chris, if you would can you just tell us all what is the best kit end-to-end at a series of price points so we can spend happily and without worry and get back to listening to music? No? OK but thanks all the same for a great site and great members.

I'm hoping to Rip the 24/192hz tracks on to the computer and then be able to play them back with a high quality DAC to be named later (using a DAC Magic for now) Any thoughts on the generic quality difference between 96 and 192? I don't have the gear to do a fair A/B test right now but would like to make some progress archiving vinyl. Likely spend now for a better A/D if 192 seems to be worth in and then later get the good DAC for listening (true be told I'm fairly happy with the DAC Magic for 96 files right now but new gear is always tempting). Thanks.

Just bought the Tom Petty Live Anthology and realized that the Hi-Rez version of the files is on Blu-Ray disc and consequently a pain to get into my Mac. While I'm OK with the CD quality files from the CD this got me thinking about other Hi-Rez releases lately, like the Neil Young Box Set(s). My question: Is the 24/192hz better enough than 24/96hz to warrant the several hundred dollars for a Blu-Ray player? Or is 24/96hz good to go? Obviously this depends on a lot of factors, including the original production and mastering of the music but the Neil Young set make the choice pretty even (You can buy 24/96hz on regular DVD, which I'm assuming I can extract with my Mac, no additional cost OR the 24/192hz on Blu-Ray which means more cost to get it into the Mac). Of course this also leads to the larger question of the general difference between 96 and 192. I have been archiving my vinyl at 24/96hz using a Apogee Duet as my A/D but now I'm wondering if i should pony up for a better A/D that can do 24/192hz. I want to do the recording only once (400+ LPs) Thanks for any comments.

I've been using Peak LE without complaint for a number of LPs. I record 96/24 AIFF and import it into iTunes without conversion (storage is so cheap now). If you bounce songs individually (instead of as a playlist) you can do it at 96/24 instead of being forced to use 96/16 when you do it as an iTunes playlist. A bit more work but I use it as the time to put the titles on each song so it isn't too much extra effort. I talked to Peak and they acknowledged it was a bug but not sure when they will address it.

Hi All, Wondering if anyone knows of specific issue related to having a very large iTunes library? I have about 400GB/17,00 songs now (fair number of 96/24 AIFF songs ripped from LPs) and am looking to acquire/merge several other libraries that will take me to over 1.5 TB and 30-45,000 songs. I'm not having any specific problems and everything i backed up but doing the moves and the post-move back-up are pretty time consuming; would like to know beforehand if there are potential problems. Thanks.

Alan, Curious if you had any feedback or expereince with this since you posted? Just got a Duet for the primary purpose of rippng LPs. The store (Guitar Center) did not have the right XLR lines/adapters to hook-up to my RCA-only phono pre-amp so I'm usng the RCA-to-Intrument/Line Level adapters that cam with the unit and recording thru the Intrument input instead of either of the XLR selections. Sounds good so far (haven't done a careful A/B compairison yet) but I'm noticing that I get pretty high recording levles into my Mac S/W (Peak LE). I have the input gain on the Instrument input turned all the way down but am still getting into the red few times on the Peak; is this a problem witht the XLR inputs? Thanks

Chris, I have found this site to be terrific and very detailed but I'm struggling with information overload on selecting a ADC for my vinyl archiving project. I'm reluctant to ask a question that might be answered somewhere else but it seems that ADCs are discussed in various places and under various names; it would be very helpful to have a thread dedicated to this topic. THanks for a great site/resource

Seems like the easiest and possibly cheapest route would be to have a cheap CPU drive the DAC at the Amp. I'm tempted to get a Mac Mini and a Touch screen in order to make a Jukebox type set up, What has people's experience been with this?

Hi, I have been ripping LPS at 24/96 and liking the results but I want to be able to access those files over my AirPort Express' via AirTunes (the good Creek amp and speakers are in the living room but the Mac is upstairs in the office). I have a Cambridge DAC connected to one AE and I notice that when I'm listening to something that I know is recorded in 24/96 the DAC indicates that the incoming sample rate is only 44.1 Is this because AirTunes/iTunes is down converting it for broadcast over the WiFi network? If so is there: 1) A way to get iTunes to bend to my will and do 96? 2) Another program (AirFoil doesn't seem to do it) that can send a full 96 file to an AE? 3) A setting on the AE that will enable 96? Or is this just a limit of the AE design? If so what other methods of wireless distribution might do higher sample rate files? Thanks. PS - I was bummed to find that my iPod wont take files with sample rates over 44.1 either. Any ideas on making that happen would be cool

I have found that Sound Soap does dull the music and it bothers me that it is touching the whole file. I worked well for taking background noise out of some recorded speeches but then that is more a matter of being abel to hear the voice. On badly scratched LP recordings I have used the "pencil" tool in Peak to go directly to the spike and edit it out. It affects a very small time span and definitely gets rid of the click. You pay for past record maintenance sins however by doing it manually; it takes long time. Programs you mention sound interesting; will check them out. Thanks. PS Still looking for a reasonably priced ADC; sounds like a look of the recommendations here are pretty pricy but may be worth it as I don't want to do this twice.

I have found that Sound Soap does dull the music and it bothers me that it is touching the whole file. I worked well for taking background noise out of some recorded speeches but then that is more a matter of being abel to hear the voice. On badly scratched LP recordings I have used the "pencil" tool in Peak to go directly to the spike and edit it out. It affects a very small time span and definitely gets rid of the click. You pay for past record maintenance sins however by doing it manually; it takes long time. Programs you mention sound interesting; will check them out. Thanks. PS Still looking for a reasonably priced ADC; sounds like a look of the recommendations here are pretty pricy but may be worth it as I don't want to do this twice.