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Squeezbox Touch vs CD player with dac

Lovely old Micromega Microdrive/Duo BS2 now resting in the spare room and in their place, a SBT/Dacmagic with a NAS drive providing the flacs. Never listened to so much music! Still buy CDs to keep it legal of course, but also download the odd 24/96 album where available. Beware these though, some are just upsampled 16/44, not from the master :-/ I'm also a bit of a Techno Dad and use the Digitally Imported app, loads of dance channels :) May upgrade the DAC at some point, MDAC?
 
adamdea said:
Why are you streaming spotify from iPhone to sbt as opposed to streaming via my squeezebox.com? Are you sure you are using max quality. Most people (inc myself)seem to find spotify frighteningly good.
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just for the convenience of basically a remote. My understanding from the SB forum was that SQ should be exactly the same if streamed via the Squeezebox iPhone app versus through the SBT/mysqueezebox.com. Would be great if they were all wrong.

It's very hard to actually figure out the compression of any specific track that's playing when using the SB app, so I've been hoping that many of the tracks may be much more compressed than the 320/Audiophile account may leave one to believe, since when it sounds bad it sounds like low bitrate AAC files.
 
adamdea said:
Me too. Cd player not literally ditched but seldom used. If I had not had a dac already when i got my SBT I'm not sure I would have bought one after
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I use my DVD/CD player a couple of times a year... primarely for SACD, DVD-A, etc... its an oppo...

however the SBT with Squeezepad App on ipad, via the MDAC .. not only sounds great, but its soo easy to use! I have nearly 2,000 CD's fully catalogued and working well (used Bliss for getting artwork, etc..) ....

I'm not throwing away my CD's, but I don't take them out anymore.... years ago I ripped them into MP3, then AAAC, then ALA, now FLAC .... tried both FLAC and WAV, and couldn't tell the difference.... so FLAC it is ...
 
I will never use a CDP again.

the SBT is that good.

It changed my life , literally.


Internet radio, bandcamp, spotify, last fm, pandora, bbc??

and High res and all your cds at the swipe of a pad?

no brainer
 
My listening habits have developed into this:

Background listening:
Spotify, internet Radio or my iTunes library through the Squeezebox Touch into my Audiolab CDQ usually playing away in the music room whilst pottering in the kitchen.

An evening of attentively discovering new tunes:
Spotify or internet radio through the SBT into the CDQ whilst sat flicking through music using the iPad in the music room.

Enjoying new CD purchases having listened to them on Spotify:
CD played through the CDQ. The SBT through the CDQ with my CDs ripped to Apple Lossless is good in isolation but not compared to the same CD played directly from the CDQ - by a LARGE margin.

I'll not be dumping CD any time soon.
 
I can't see me ever using a CDP again. SBT does pretty much everything I need, and all from the comfort of my sofa.
 
muzzer said:
There we have it then £150 front end beats everything! best we all sell up.
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I wouldn't say "beats" everything, but as it's transparent, certainly equals anything else transparent, and for only £150. When convenience is taken into account, it does seem to have a lot going for it.

S.
 
lovejoy said:
My listening habits have developed into this:

Background listening:
Spotify, internet Radio or my iTunes library through the Squeezebox Touch into my Audiolab CDQ usually playing away in the music room whilst pottering in the kitchen.

An evening of attentively discovering new tunes:
Spotify or internet radio through the SBT into the CDQ whilst sat flicking through music using the iPad in the music room.

Enjoying new CD purchases having listened to them on Spotify:
CD played through the CDQ. The SBT through the CDQ with my CDs ripped to Apple Lossless is good in isolation but not compared to the same CD played directly from the CDQ - by a LARGE margin.

I'll not be dumping CD any time soon.
Click to expand...

Same as my experience above. Any difference when using spotify through your iPad (same app as iphone) or just through the SBT? I've been working on this since the first SB came out!
 
My purchasing habits are:

1. Vinyl when available.

The choice between CD and DL is down to availability and cost:

1. High quality DL’s are still not that widespread.
2. High quality DL’s when available are often significantly more expensive than CDs (why?).
3. Sometimes, download is the only available format.

At this point in time, if I buy a CD, I play it on the CDP; I generally don’t bother to rip it.

SQ of the SBT is ridiculously good for the price (I paid £129 for mine), and I couldn’t live without one now.

I tend to download from Boomkat, Juno, Bleep, Soundcloud and Bandcamp, though I’ve recently had to install iTunes too, because annoyingly, it is the only source for some new releases.

When available, I tend to go for Flacs.

Why is it that most Amazon downloads sound so poor?
 
bec143 said:
just for the convenience of basically a remote. My understanding from the SB forum was that SQ should be exactly the same if streamed via the Squeezebox iPhone app versus through the SBT/mysqueezebox.com. Would be great if they were all wrong.

It's very hard to actually figure out the compression of any specific track that's playing when using the SB app, so I've been hoping that many of the tracks may be much more compressed than the 320/Audiophile account may leave one to believe, since when it sounds bad it sounds like low bitrate AAC files.
Click to expand...

Sorry not trying to be pedantic but i am not following you. You can stream spotify via mysqueezebox.com through the SBT. You can control the SBT using a variety of smartphone/tablet apps including ipeng. But in that case the iphone is just controlling the SBT- it is not in the audio chain.

On the other hand you could always use the iphone spotify app and use the iphone's analog outs into your pre amp. Equally you could use ipeng to stream from mysqueezebox.com and replay through the iphone as a virtual sbt via its analog outs as above.

I am a bit confused by your description as to what you are doing. If it is the second and third i would not be surprised if it did not sound as good. Either way there are probably some quality settings you should check.
 
adamdea said:
Sorry not trying to be pedantic but i am not following you. You can stream spotify via mysqueezebox.com through the SBT. You can control the SBT using a variety of smartphone/tablet apps including ipeng. But in that case the iphone is just controlling the SBT- it is not in the audio chain.

On the other hand you could always use the iphone spotify app and use the iphone's analog outs into your pre amp. Equally you could use ipeng to stream from mysqueezebox.com and replay through the iphone as a virtual sbt via its analog outs as above.

I am a bit confused by your description as to what you are doing. If it is the second and third i would not be surprised if it did not sound as good. Either way there are probably some quality settings you should check.
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The first option, simply controlling SBT with iPhone. Should have no impact on SQ. I'm not saying that I don't use this, but it really does not come to close to my CDP most of the time. HAve been through a gazillion permutations (DACs, power supplies, optical, coax, etc) since the first SB came out nearly 10 years ago, still can't match the SQ of a CDP with any SB setup.
 
bec143 said:
The first option, simply controlling SBT with iPhone. Should have no impact on SQ. I'm not saying that I don't use this, but it really does not come to close to my CDP most of the time. HAve been through a gazillion permutations (DACs, power supplies, optical, coax, etc) since the first SB came out nearly 10 years ago, still can't match the SQ of a CDP with any SB setup.
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sure it doesn't. it isn't that the CDP is actually better, it is that your perception is skewed in favor of it.

level matched and blind and the CDP....no longer dominates
 
Teddy Ray said:
sure it doesn't. it isn't that the CDP is actually better, it is that your perception is skewed in favor of it.

level matched and blind and the CDP....no longer dominates
Click to expand...

actually I am very biased to want the SBT to sound better, and have done more attempts at blinding and level matching than I care to recount. Hardly use CDP any more, but earn we do listen to a CD, it's just better, and no rigorous testing needed to prove it. It usually happens after we hear something on Spotify and decide to listen to the CD.
 
I bought a Squeezebox Touch at Christmas. Although it's okay and would be fine for background music, it's nowhere near as good as my Linn Ikemi. It got played with for a few days and is now back in its box. I should really try it with a DAC sometime I guess.
 
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