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In Reply to: RE: I recall an earlier post from you when you had posted by oldmkvi on May 13, 2015 at 07:28:49
- A big bulk of our listening involved around comparisons between dsd files of different ways of ripping sacd disc via a PS3 - yes, that's right, different ways of process/preparation while ripping did affect sonic results very audibly.
So, my advise is - stick to dsd downloads to feed your Z1ES.
A few things we found out:- Playing the same dsd file track loaded on the Z1ES twice in a row will audibly degrade sound quality. Where the first time play was smooth and musical, if you skip back to start playing the same track from the beginning again, it will acquire a nervy fatiguing artifact. To get around this problem, you just need to select a different track to play first (any duration of play will do), then go back and re select that desired track again. This will avoid the sound degradation I mentioned. The jog dial and menu screen helps facilitate this. Shutting down and restart the unit prior to playing each track sounds best, of course.
- Switching off dsd up sampling function (and PCM to dsd) improves sound quality for the player while playing dsd files.
- If you are going to use balanced connections, make sure the XLR terminals to be connected at the player, the hot and cold pins are swapped. This is the best way to ensure correct absolute polarity downstream while avoiding the pitfalls of cabling and component signal flow directionality getting reversed.
Reverting to single ended RCA connection won't get you correct absolute polarity because the problem occurs in the digital domain within the player.
Without correcting for the Z1ES's inversion of absolute polarity, the sound was pleasant enough, polite, almost too polite, and uninvolving....
Edits: 05/13/15Follow Ups:
Well sure enough Jerome, the Z1 does seem to invert the polarity. For the benefit of the reader is a link below.
Having used DSP for crossovers I understand what you say about overtaxing the unit. Usually by heavy stuff like changing the gain. I notice that the remote tablet program for the Z1 has volume controls, but they are disabled. Trying to adjust volume in the digital realm is just the kind of thing that would overburden the DSP. It's one thing I don't get about the Z1. It's like they designed it to be the only source and preamp, but then didn't put a volume knob on it. That's a head scratcher.
Thanks for sharing your findings. The Z1 is new to me, so I haven't tried all the settings, and their permutations, but there is one thing I think I can say unequivocally. Converting and upsampling 44/16 to 2x DSD is the best thing to happen to RBCD since the jewel case. It may be it's best future.
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Big speakers and little amps blew my mind!
Make sure you invert absolute polarity only at the power amp's output speaker terminals!
Polarity comment got me thinking, and I've reversed both speaker connections,
and so far I'm loving it!
More testing tomorrow when I'll have more time.
Travel Guide/Ralph Towner and Somewhere/Keith Jarret are sounding 3 dimensional
and generally awesome.
I haven't switched things back yet, but so far, I'm happy!
I don't recall my system sounding this good!
Mark 6,
I got to tell you what I heard tonight, and it's not from the direction I thought.
Yes I reversed the speaker wires. Yes maybe a subtle improvement. I posted a link on previous post, and since the Z1 does invert the polarity, then yes I will compensate for that.
What was most interesting to me tonight was this. I have this 192/24 download of Yes, Close to the Edge from Rhino. I listened to it, and thought they had tilted up the tone/pitch to accentuate the highs. I thought I had wasted my $25 just like Sordidman and others are talking about. After reading Jerome's comments I decided to turn off all the filters as a starting point. No DSEE, conversion to DSD, oversampling. I guess that means I was just running PCM through a one bit Sabre chip? Anyway, the album went from sounding wrong to sounding spot on. More than pleasantly surprised. I had a smile on my face when the pipe organ kicked in. :)
This wasn't the result I expected. All this after that post about 44/16 to DSD. I still agree with that.
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Big speakers and little amps blew my mind!
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