In Reply to: I have a Z1. Why use an external DAC? posted by oldmkvi on October 20, 2016 at 10:46:15:
And in turn that affects sound quality.
Yes, while you may now get higher density of data, but this comes at the expense of immediacy, dynamic contrast, and musical ease.
This issue of activating an extra digital-based feature putting extra strain on onboard dsp processing power leading to poorer sound quality has always plague their company's products.
Starting with all their DVD players - leaving the Dynamic Range Control (drc) on affects both SACD and CD playback sound quality, even though this feature is supposed to affect Dolby Digital sound tracks only. I've mentioned this more than a few times here. Search for "drc".
On their SACD players, there are much worse issues:
- setting player to default cd mode (reading the cd layer first) affected SACD playback
- turning on the optional slow filter affect SACD playback (even though this feature was supposed to work on cd playback only)
- setting player to default m-ch mode affects 2-ch SACD and CD playback. (Mentioned many many times here. Search the archives)
The m-ch / 2-ch default mode was the main reason why, on the xa5400es, the switching between both playback modes became implemented as a physical switch at the back panel, instead of digital-based activation.
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Follow Ups
- Turning on the remastering feature puts a load on processing power - jeromelang 16:03:15 10/20/16 (9)
- puts a load on processing power - oldmkvi 10:42:32 10/22/16 (0)
- "always plague their company's products." - oldmkvi 10:20:32 10/22/16 (0)
- RE: Turning on the remastering feature puts a load on processing power - Mr_Steady 17:52:25 10/20/16 (5)
- DSEE is used right up to 24/192. nt - oldmkvi 18:31:24 10/20/16 (1)
- RE: DSEE is used right up to 24/192. nt - Mr_Steady 18:39:23 10/20/16 (0)
- I can tell you that Transients in Live Orchs and Big Bands - oldmkvi 18:25:31 10/20/16 (1)
- RE: I can tell you that Transients in Live Orchs and Big Bands - Mr_Steady 18:36:47 10/20/16 (0)
- I found it a little soft and bland without the Precision Mode. - oldmkvi 18:04:51 10/20/16 (0)
- Reviewers and I like it better w/R.E. - oldmkvi 16:15:16 10/20/16 (0)