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Since buying the Bryston BDP-2/BDA-2 player/DAC combo last winter, I've ripped almost my entire CD collection in uncompressed wav using DB Poweramp's latest version, using AccurateRip. Though much of my current listening is HiRez downloaded files (which the Bryston combo handles beautifully) I still love to listen to music from my old CD collection.
I've noticed that these tracks don't have the punch and involvement I recall when previously listening through my Marantz SA7S1 player (now sold)
I've tried 2 different optical drives for reading the discs - my internal Blu-Ray writer, and an external LG read/writer. Both yield "perfect" rips - and produce the same results.
Did the Marantz player spoil me by somehow enhancing Redbook playback, and I'm now hearing the real deal? Have I been spoiled by hi-rez and so all 44k/16 bit sounds lacking? Well, to test the latter, I downloaded a 44k/16 bit version of a CD rip and compared them. The download sounded better, more space, deeper low end and definitely more involving. A quick "blinded" AB (with the help of the wife) correctly identified the source each time.
So, despite an "accurate" rip, are there other factors, namely in the source/reader hardware or others, that could audibly impact the quality of a rip?
Follow Ups:
the digital transports are closer to the actual sound of the 16 bit tracks, they are garbage.
I use tubes in the chain to smooth it out.
Do you mean to tell me nobody here uses CD treatments prior to ripping!? Well, I'll be hogtied.
Its more likely just jitter or your playback software or the combination. Maybe changing to Amarra and Mac or adding a low-jitter USB converter would improve this.
What playback software are you using?
I've almost never heard a PC playing CD-quality wav files that I thought sounded comparable to a good CD player or transport/DAC....
"Since buying the Bryston BDP-2/BDA-2 player/DAC combo last winter, I've ripped almost my entire CD collection in uncompressed wav using DB Poweramp's latest version, using AccurateRip. Though much of my current listening is HiRez downloaded files (which the Bryston combo handles beautifully) I still love to listen to music from my old CD collection."
I personally find CD the most-enjoyable digitized medium.... I think the RFI just gets too overbearing with high-rez.
"I've noticed that these tracks don't have the punch and involvement I recall when previously listening through my Marantz SA7S1 player (now sold)"
Your mistake was presuming it would sound comparable or better.... I've tried it with a handful of recordings over the years, and when I sampled the playback, it became apparent that PCs were not going to displace CD playback for me in the foreseeable future.
"I've tried 2 different optical drives for reading the discs - my internal Blu-Ray writer, and an external LG read/writer. Both yield 'perfect' rips - and produce the same results."
Different PCs, operating systems, clock speeds, hard drives, ripping software, software drivers, etc. vary the performance of the ripping. Even defragging the drive affect how the data is read off the disk. There are so many variables in playing music off the hard drive, it could be a very exasperating endeavor if the resultant sound isn't right.
The fact the PCs are RFI monsters doesn't help matters either. As I've stated elsewhere, I've never heard playback off a computer that I thought was as musically satisfying as playing CDs on a good CD player.
"Did the Marantz player spoil me by somehow enhancing Redbook playback, and I'm now hearing the real deal? Have I been spoiled by hi-rez and so all 44k/16 bit sounds lacking? Well, to test the latter, I downloaded a 44k/16 bit version of a CD rip and compared them. The download sounded better, more space, deeper low end and definitely more involving. A quick 'blinded' AB (with the help of the wife) correctly identified the source each time."
You should also check the data if the files are numerically identical. You could have downloaded a better mastered copy.... Of if the data is identical, the software writing the data to disk wrote the data where it was later read in a more ideal manner.
"So, despite an 'accurate' rip, are there other factors, namely in the source/reader hardware or others, that could audibly impact the quality of a rip?"
Could be a lot of factors. From the latency between data read and write (which can induce jitter), synergy with operating system, synergy with device drivers, etc. ... With a different music player, you might prefer the other file. This is how unpredictable the process is.
This is the reason why I use audio playback with my computer expressly for streaming music or video off websites. I leave purchased music solely for CD playback on a CD player/changer or for vinyl playback.
Todd, thanks for your response. I specifically planned to avoid PC playback for all the reasons you listed. The Bryston combo uses a stand alone player (BDP-2) with a dedicated 1TB solid-state drive, connected by e-sata or usb cable to the player. This then provides the data to the 192k/24 DAC via a high quality AES/EBU cable. I am not streaming from my PC. The BDP player can connect to PC either directly or thru Wi-Fi for the purpose of transferring files to its hard drive. Other than that instance, its not connected.
The setup works beautifully for downloaded HiRez and 44k/16 files, it just falls short for ripped CD.
If the "deficiencies" lie somewhere in the playback chain, I can rest easy knowing I have archived my CD collection in the most accurate manner. But if the problems lay in the rips, I would consider re-ripping with the appropriate adjustments. That's all I'm trying to sort out.
Cheers.
I'm a "generation" back of you with the players/DAC: 1's. I can definitely say that playing the CDs on my best CDP *does* sound a tiny bit better, and that is through the same DAC using the same AES/EBU input (wish the DAC had two of them...). [The CDP does *not* sound better than the file player when using the DAC coaxial input for the CDP.]The CDP does sound a tiny bit brighter and more forward, just a tiny but noticeable bit more lively; it's the same data interface. That interface is an analog one though, so clearly something in the way the data is sent over the interface is working its way through it and results in the sound difference. This boggles my mind a bit, and I do tend to lean towards Todd's explanation of more HF noise from the file player "muddying" the analog on the AES/EBU connection. That's all I've got...it's good to have source choices. [Edit: I suppose the CDP might have a less robust AES/EBU output circuitry than the file player, though signal amplitude looks similar.]
Playing the files is a whole other world though, no way I would give up that flexibility and access; my mind jumps to what I want to hear next based on what I last played. That is natural to me, and doing it the "old" way is more due to my laziness than natural desire ("oh man, do I have to get up, might as well listen to a bit more of this album"). Getting up disrupts the groove, man. :)
My CD rips are perfect (!), I've been using EAC for a long time and know how to set it up (lots of options!), so make sure you calibrate it to your disc drives. And those (probably DVD) drives are not all the same in their abilty or speed, price or newness is no indication either. Actually my best one is a "crappy" old drive, but it's really really handy to have multiple ones, some do some things better than others. Now that I think of it, my "best" ones are not also burners. I once replaced them with burner types but I rip a lot more than burn so put a couple reader-only types back in.
Edits: 07/13/14
"My CD rips are perfect (!)..."
The vast majority of CD rips are perfect, in regard to the numeric data represented (as long as "normalization" isn't utilized).... But rips by different programs sound different because of how the data is written to disk.... The differences occur during playback, where one rip induces a different jitter response to another.... And would differ yet again with different playback software, or even after an update to the operating system.
And the jitter responses would change yet again if the hard drive were to be "defragged", or recovered from backup data in the event of a drive crash.
Too many variables, and too little control over them.
I like to think that the SBT kind of isolates me from most of the disc-reading anomalies. Gets the "music" via ethernet cable; has ~15s buffer for the .wav it gets from an original CD source, ~5s for the .wav it gets from a 96/24 DVD-A source. So the SBT has relatively little to do, just assemble the packets (from an otherwise unused network) and get them to the S/PDIF output. I like to think that the SBT's S/PDIF output is the limiting factor for that part of the pre-DAC chain, and I like to think I've done a half-decent job on the linear PS too. Perhaps "I like to think" a little too much... :) It all sounds decent, but I can't say it sounds better than my best CDP (same DAC), and there are much better CDPs than mine.Just wanted to correct something I noticed I said in my previous post. Though I said the CDP sounds a bit better, I also said it may have a *less* robust AES/EBU interface circuitry than the BDP-1. The context in which I said that contradicts my argument as to my speculation as to why the CDP may sound better...so I shouldn't have said it period. I *do* know what the CDP's AES/EBU output circuitry exactly is. But I *don't know* what it is in the BDP-1 as it's not mine so I won't open it, it's on longish-term loan from a military friend who's temporarily stationed in a non-120V/60Hz country. The BDA-1 is mine.
I have not *directly* compared the BDP-1/BDA-1 to the SBT, this is not easy to do here in a relatively quick manner (would be easier with the BDP-2), but listening to both over time, there's not a lot of diff. The diff is more obvious to me when using the CDP.
I am a bit anal about defragging my HDs that I play music from. I even defrag the backup drives...that could be "dangerous".
Edits: 07/14/14
If a rip was made to hard drive, then if there is any question the ripped files can be copied hard drive to hard drive. This will remove any physical effects associated with the original rip, replacing them with the physical effects associated with the file copy. If you are paranoid, you can carry this file copy process multiple generations. Because of the speed and ability to rewrite files on a hard drive this is a quick and easy tweak. How much it affects the sound you hear will depend on your system, etc...
Tony Lauck
"Diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform." - P.R. Sarkar
Hmm. It would be interesting to get hold of a same master download versus CD rip and actually COMPARE the bits! It seems to be there must be some freeware program to allow you to do this, i.e. strip any header information and just give you the bitstream. Then, all you need to do is compare just a handful of bytes at a few random intervals to be certain that it is EXACTLY the same bitstream. At that point, the only difference is the HEADER information and the CPU processing going on.
My guess is that if they sound different, the bitstream must be different, but I wouldn't rule out TOO MUCH processing going on and creating some sort of noise in the system.
I listen mostly to CD from a player, so not much personal experience with any comparison to computer audio. In fact, all my attempts and I was not impressed with my computer audio results.
Exact audio copy allows comparing two WAV files for equality. This will work providing there are no offset errors. If there are offset errors (different number of empty samples at the start of the two files) then EAC won't necessarily give a complete picture of what is going on. In which case, a better approach is to use an audio editor to look at the individual samples and line them up. Then you can mix them together with one of the two out of polarity to get a difference file. This should be all zeros, but if there are errors you will be able to find them. I assume this can be done with free editors such as Audacity. I have been using Soundforge Pro 10 for a number of years and do these comparisons from time to time.
You should be aware that offset errors and changes to headers have been reported as causing audible differences. According to digital theory, if the samples are the same there should be no audible difference due to changes in headers, MP3 tags, file names, etc., but theory is nearly always trumped by practice. Changes in headers but not samples can produce audible differences, at least on some systems that are sensitive to things that, in an ideal world, they should not be sensitive to.
Tony Lauck
"Diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform." - P.R. Sarkar
"Changes in headers but not samples can produce audible differences, at least on some systems that are sensitive to things that, in an ideal world, they should not be sensitive to."I have wondered about that before, but don't recall seeing anybody discuss it, so just assumed it wasn't important and just one more thing to not be concerned with.
Do you have any more discussion of this, offhand? Don't go to a lot of trouble as I will look for it myself, but if you recall anything (link, etc.)...thanks.
I do my audio-file assembling on a machine that's remote from the actual file player, so all the player sees is the .wav data *plus* the ethernet packaging headers. They're still headers though, in the sense of data that isn't representing audio. I don't think this is the type of thing you were referring to, as the data extraction scenario is different since the player app doesn't even "see" the header.
Edit: I am specifically speaking of my SB Touch setup here, not the BDP1/BDA1 setup which *could* be susceptible to the exact header thing you're speaking of.
Edits: 07/13/14
It seems plausible that what is going on in the computer will have less effect on the sound if the computer is physically and electrically very distant from any of the analog equipment. But then, a more complex playback chain will have more complex failure modes. I suggest somehow capturing the bits that are going to the DAC and verifying that they correspond to the bits on the CD. If you use SPDIF to the DAC you can connect the cable to a digital in of a separate computer and record the stream. There may be various "loop back" tricks available that don't require extra hardware, but these won't catch all the possible places where the bits could get corrupted. IMO it is a complete waste of time to do anything regarding subjective sound quality of computer audio until one has first verified that the correct bits are actually making it to the DAC.
There have been threads regarding the effect of FLAC to WAV conversion and impact on headers. There have also been threads discussing the effect of offset errors on digital sound files. There have also been threads on how two bit-identical files might sound different.
Tony Lauck
"Diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform." - P.R. Sarkar
Unfortunately I don't have a computer with a general (audio) digital input, except USB. So I'd have to get some interface gadget and use USB somehow.
I didn't realize those topics you mentioned at the end there were the same thing as the header "problem". FWIW I don't notice a sonic diff between WAVs and FLACs, and the diff would have to be get significant before I'd be willing to give up the tagging flexibility/convenience of FLACs. Compared to the playback limitations of tagged WAVs, not worth it to me.
I really think that just a plain old hex editor with search mode will be sufficient for a basic test. Just search on a pattern given some offset and see if you can locate the similar pattern on the next bitstream at the same location. Trying to CAPTURE SPDIF info would be trickier IMO as the interface may always be transmitting SOMETHING such as some control signal to just wait for the sample to arrive.
What sound card are you using to pull the data stream from your computer into your Bryston? Could that be holding you back?
I never trust my audio memory anyway.
Jim Tavegia
It is hard to know without hearing it. My guess is the gain of the Marantz was higher. Music can sound more dynamic when the source gain is high IMO. Rips tend to be more composed and easier to follow than the original CD in my setup. That can also change perceptions.
The Marantz SACD Player is/was excellent but if you don't have it around to compare, you're relying on 'sonic memory' which is unreliable.
What are you using as a storage medium? USB stick or NAS? I would think how the source is powered sould also make a difference, but it might not explain the difference between a download and a rip since you're presumably using the same storage medium for both.
I also use Lossless Uncompressed FLAC... But that is my preference...
Getting rid of ReplayGain made a nice sonic upgrade...:)
N/T
Can you borrow a different DAC, to see if that gives you better sound than Bryston?
The Brystons sound wonderful with downloaded HiRez and 44/16bit wav. Much preferred over the Marantz. Just not with ripped redbook. I'd be willing to re-rip my entire collection if I knew what caused the difference.
By the way, none of this sounds bad, in fact to most casual or unfamiliar listeners it all "sounds great"
Sorry, but you are comparing "apples to oranges" here. The Marantz "sound shaped" what you were hearing on your CDs. That is why the rips sound different.Forget about using "Replay Gain". What you want to do is expand the "bit depth" of the CDs to "24 bit" on a second pass of the CDs that you've ripped(while you'rer at it , increase your Sampling rate to 88.2khz). This can all be done in dBPoweramp.
I'm pretty sure this is only an approximation of what the Marantz processing was doing to the information on the CD before sending it through the output anyway. (Actually, that's not true, but I do know increasing the bit & sampling rate of rips has worked exceptiionally well for me, regardless of what you may have heard)
Edits: 07/10/14
Could dbPA have some kind of filtering turned on by accident?
"Well, to test the latter, I downloaded a 44k/16 bit version of a CD rip and compared them. The download sounded better, more space, deeper low end and definitely more involving. "
But was the downloaded 44/16 file from the same masters that the CD was created from?
I just downloaded the newly remastered 24/96 Led Zeppelin I, II, II and bought the new Deluxe CDs from the same remastering. The downloads and my CD rips sound nearly identical, both outstanding.
Had I ripped from the original decades old CDs, they too would sound pretty dull compared to the remasters.
"But was the downloaded 44/16 file from the same masters that the CD was created from?"
Yes, made sure of that. And consistently repeated with 3 albums.
happen to like the sound of the Marantz. All components have a characteristic sound and it does not necessarily have to do with the digital conversion process; the analogue stage MATTERS a lot.
If you ever heard side-by-side comparisons between the various Audionote DACs you will get to hear just how important is that analogue stage. From their cheapest DAC to the most expensive the price range is breathtaking, but, they all use the same chipset and vary primarily in terms of power supply and the analogue output stage. I heard a shootout between a DAC 3, DAC 4 and DAC 5 that clearly demonstrated the superiority of the dearer models and this was evident even when the source was a Sonos server playing off of MOG or some other service.
Larry, good suggestion. But - it doesn't explain why the downloaded version of the same 44k/16bit file sounded better than the ripped version. Same mastering for both files. Downloaded version sounded much like the silver disc did on my Marantz player. Obviously not a direct comparison, but the download had the satisfying punch I had come to associate with that familiar recording.
It might not necessarily be an apples-to-apples comparison (the download might be from a different digital source, such as a different master). Because you ripped to WAV, you should be getting the best possible sound from a CD rip.
There was a multi-issue article in The Absolute Sound that came out a little more than a year ago which purported to be a thorough analysis on the subject. The authors concluded that type of rip mattered a lot (WAV preferred over all other lossless formats), and that even the program used to rip WAV files mattered. I have no idea myself whether these claims are true or not. I have heard a demonstration of a CD ripped to WAV and stored on a NAS vs. a thumbdrive file of a file of the same CD ripped to FLAC and played on the same server (Naim NDS). The WAV file sounded better to me, but, even this test was not exactly an apples-to-apples comparison.
I currently have my 4,200+ collection of CDs ripped to WAV on a Naim NDS/Uniti system. The sound is decent, but, I actually prefer the sound of my CD player (Naim CD555). Although both are made by Naim, nothing is really shared by the two systems, aside from the same separate power supply, so I cannot say that the difference has anything to do with files vs. CD playback. But, I do have some doubts about the claims that playback from files is inherently superior to CD playback.
Altho, I agree that NDS and CD555 sound different rather than which one is better but properly recorded high res files off a turntable sounds definitely better over the CD555. Actually I thought that was the only reasons I was going to get an NDS. I think that there are number of ways to improve the sound, but fundamentally, I think that they are different animal. ( one would prefer over the other I think )
Did you listen to both of your 555PS separately? Sometimes, there are differences in unit to unit. So for the head unit comparison, it's preferable to use the same exact power supply for an AB dem.
The types of rips absolutely matters from mediocre to pretty good.
Yes, it is ripped by an nServe to a 8TB Qnap NAS (also backed up by an 8TB Qnap at a friend's place (backed up by internet link)). I have a separate laptop that I thought I would use for editing of the metadata, but, I have found that using the iPad that is the remote control for selecting music to do editing is actually just as easy to use.
I have not done any kind of side-by-side comparison. I simply noted that the "sound" is different and that a system that sounded very similar, whether I played digital or vinyl sources, is no longer that similar. Because I listen more to my digital source, I have retuned the system to make that source sound good, and now the vinyl sounds a bit too dull in the upper midrange (my speakers allow for a lot of adjustment of driver output).
I own only one power supply. When I went to the NDS, I simply pulled the CD555 and switched in the NDS.
So, despite an "accurate" rip, are there other factors, namely in the source/reader hardware or others, that could audibly impact the quality of a rip?
Highly unlikely.
If you use AccurateRip, you can be confident it is the right rip.
It is very unlikely it are the bits.
If they are mangled somewhere it will be random errors and when higher order bits are flipping, you will run for your volume control as it is pop, crackle, etc.
If you have a rip of a CD and a download of the same CD: are they bit identical?
Are you sure they are from the same "master"?
The Well Tempered Computer
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