Streamer vs high end CDP: Results of bakeoff

[Mr_Sukebe]

Just finished the rather small bakeoff to compare my streaming solution vs a good CDP. Unfortunately the original invite turned into a bit of a weird debate, which meant that there were just the two of us. My thanks to Philip for popping down, was a pleasure to meet and chat.

As for the morning:
Philip had brought along a fairly old Audio Research CDP and an MC2 650 integrated amp. Not sure about the vintage of the CDP, but probably a good 15 years old. The debate about incremental improvements in CD technology can be saved for another thread. I've heard AR kit before and it's never dissapointed. Might look prosaic, but sounded wonderful.

As I don't have an integrated or analogue pre-amp, the MC2 was used as the pre and power amp between each source and the speakers. Speakers were my Impulse Ta'us, which are 94db/w horn loaded 3 ways, which are close to full range.
My own source is a Meridian 861v4 AV processor with an ID40 card (streaming capability) and recent Linear PSU upgrade. Upfront, it's worth mentioning that whilst the AR was nothing like cheap, that when new the 861 would have been well over £12k with the cards I have fitted.

We played a variety of music, from pop, light vocal to live rock (e.g. Rainbow on Stage). Volume matching was pretty difficult because the 861 includes it's own volume control and the MC2 has a pretty difficult to read small rotary dial. For all the same, I thought the differences were pretty consistent across most of the tracks. In summary:
- Overall, very little in it. You certainly wouldn't say either was a "class above the other"
- The AR was smoother (or more smeared depending upon how you want to read that), which made vocals sound lovely and less "pinched" than the Meridian.
- The Meridian was more detailed and did a better job of bass control

So back to the original reason for this day to even happy, i.e. Steven Toy's assertion that no streamer is better than a high end-CDP. Sorry, but you're wrong. Sure, took a lot of money thrown at the Meridian source, but the results really weren't dramatically different. Or were they...

Once we'd nailed the differences via the MC2, we then played around with some of the other options.
First being to re-introduce my Bel Canto Evo2 power amp. The MC2 frankly has brilliant big, ballsy bass, but in other ways was for me a good step back. Far less fluid, detailed. For me, re-introducing the BC solved the majority of the smoothness issue with vocals, thus eliminating most of the key benefit of the AR.
2nd up was to power up my old Rel Storm3 sub. Might be ancient and in theory not doing very much, but it really does add something that's typically missing, and made up for the most of the benefit of the MC2 power. This is all whilst retaining the detail and transparency of the 861.

I then walked through the capability of the 861 to play BD audio and SACD disks via the HD621 that I have.

So, again back to the original question, "does a streamer sound as good as a high CDP", yes, and that's in isolation. No, there wasn't really much in it overall. T
However, the unit I have then added in the benefits of:
- when mixed in with the rest of my kit, definitely more than the sum of the parts
- Room correction capability, which was fairly apparent as we went through a variety of tracks.
- SACD/BD audio capability
- Oh yeah, happens to be an AV processor that will blow away make pretty much any mainstream manufacturer receiver (e.g. Yam)

Philip, please do add in your own thoughts.

 

[Lee T]

See this is the problem I stated, you say Steven's assumptions are wrong, but you only tested this with this equipment, there are a plethora of cd players, streamers etc out there that could create a very different conclusion, it's why no one turned up as it's all down to personal taste, as you say, you loved this cd player, having had dealings with it many years ago, I did not so....

It's down to personal taste as with any equipment, there is absolutely no way of proving a streamer can out perform or equal a high end cd player. Some will prefer the cd some won't, who is to say is correct.

I , for a short period owned a squeezebox touch, this machine supposed to be on a level with at least a £300 cd player, I own a Rotel RCD-02, so of similar price, it wasn't even a contest in terms of power, detail, drive & weight, it was like John Wayne versus Tom cruise, Tom dashing & leaping around whilst John held out one hand & stopped every move without breaking stride, no contest. But as I say, that's my personal opinion based on my personal tastes which is no different to your test.

 

[smithy]

Enjoyable morning ,Mikes Meridian 861 is some beast does everything cept make coffee,it's room correction facilities made an enormous difference to the sound in his room.Liking horn loudspeakers myself I was interested to hear a pair of Impulse Taus driven by some high end equipment surprised that no one else was motivated.Was not a strict comparison per se but a 20 year old CDP can still put up a good show.

 

[Plugger]

Interesting comparison - thanks for posting this.

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

See this is the problem I stated, you say Steven's assumptions are wrong, but you only tested this with this equipment, there are a plethora of cd players, streamers etc out there that could create a very different conclusion, it's why no one turned up as it's all down to personal taste, as you say, you loved this cd player, having had dealings with it many years ago, I did not so....

It's down to personal taste as with any equipment, there is absolutely no way of proving a streamer can out perform or equal a high end cd player. Some will prefer the cd some won't, who is to say is correct.

I , for a short period owned a squeezebox touch, this machine supposed to be on a level with at least a £300 cd player, I own a Rotel RCD-02, so of similar price, it wasn't even a contest in terms of power, detail, drive & weight, it was like John Wayne versus Tom cruise, Tom dashing & leaping around whilst John held out one hand & stopped every move without breaking stride, no contest. But as I say, that's my personal opinion based on my personal tastes which is no different to your test.

Agreed that different people have different preferences and thus will have alternative views on what is "better".
However, ST had put forward a blanket statement, inferring that it would be true for all. Quite clearly, NOT true.

Have to say that I would have preferred to have hosted a larger selection of CDPs, but, that's life.

 

[BE718]

Agreed that different people have different preferences and thus will have alternative views on what is "better".
However, ST had put forward a blanket statement, inferring that it would be true for all. Quite clearly, NOT true.

Have to say that I would have preferred to have hosted a larger selection of CDPs, but, that's life.

On what basis was did ST make the statement that no streamer is better than a CDP? Thats a pretty sweeping statement and not one I can see a technical justification for. There is no fundamental reason why streamer could not match or exceed a CDP. This is ignoring the potential to play higher resolution formats or DSD.

 

[Lee T]

Agreed that different people have different preferences and thus will have alternative views on what is "better".
However, ST had put forward a blanket statement, inferring that it would be true for all. Quite clearly, NOT true.

Have to say that I would have preferred to have hosted a larger selection of CDPs, but, that's life.

But yet again as I said, you state "quite clearly not true" based on this one test & your preferences, you may carry out another test with different equipment & come to a different conclusion. To make a blanket statement based on this one test you have carried out just doesn't hold water.

If other's had decided to turn up they may have disagreed with your conclusion based on the same test.

Sound quality is all too personalised as you know so a test such as this cannot confirm one way or another as I said from the start

You cannot claim Steven was wrong in his assessment as you stated he did just the same as he cannot claim all high end cd players will outperform streamers.

You saying this is no different to him.

The test was never going to confirm anything & is why imo that people resisted in showing up for this.

 

[BE718]

But yet again as I said, you state "quite clearly not true" based on this one test & your preferences, you may carry out another test with different equipment & come to a different conclusion. To make a blanket statement based on this one test you have carried out just doesn't hold water.

If other's had decided to turn up they may have disagreed with your conclusion based on the same test.

So what is the premise that a streamer could not be as good as a CDP based on?

 

[Lee T]

So what is the premise that a streamer could not be as good as a CDP based on?

There is none

Each to their own as I said, I preferred my cd player to my squeezebox based on my preferences such as increased detail, weight, drive & an overall sense of power, others may not so would conclude the streamer sounded "better"

There is no way of testing this & quite frankly does anyone really care as long as your happy with what you have.

I still prefer placing a cd in my player over searching through menu's for music, other's prefer the menu option.

 

[Sibbers]

The user experience doesn't determine how a thing sounds tho. I dunno, I think that there are some things you can confidently say are better and the 'some people might prefer' argument fails. My TV DAC doesn't sound as good as my dedicated DAC - doubt anyone would disagree with that, and if they did then they are wrong or trying to pick a fight. Same with cassettes versus CDPs.

Nuances or presentations of hardware could be arguable, along with system synergy but I think as the reasonably intelligent things that we are, there is plenty that we can say is just outright better. In my humble opinion, anyway.

 

[BE718]

There is none

Each to their own as I said, I preferred my cd player to my squeezebox based on my preferences such as increased detail, weight, drive & an overall sense of power, others may not so would conclude the streamer sounded "better"

There is no way of testing this & quite frankly does anyone really care as long as your happy with what you have.

I still prefer placing a cd in my player over searching through menu's for music, other's prefer the menu option.

Agreed. There is no way to comprehensively test this, too many products, but there is no fundamental reason why a streamer could not be as good as a cd. Also higher resolution sources could allow it to sound better.

So its a total non argument.

...and some prefer placing a record on a turntable Nothing wrong with that

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

But yet again as I said, you state "quite clearly not true" based on this one test & your preferences, you may carry out another test with different equipment & come to a different conclusion. To make a blanket statement based on this one test you have carried out just doesn't hold water.

If other's had decided to turn up they may have disagreed with your conclusion based on the same test.

Sound quality is all too personalised as you know so a test such as this cannot confirm one way or another as I said from the start

You cannot claim Steven was wrong in his assessment as you stated he did just the same as he cannot claim all high end cd players will outperform streamers.

You saying this is no different to him.

The test was never going to confirm anything & is why imo that people resisted in showing up for this.

Just to be clear, ST's statement was:

Nobody prefers streaming from a sound quality point of view. At best folks think it's 'just as good.' At worst they are happy to sacrifice sound quality for convenience and having the latest technology.

He was quite explicit that no one prefers streaming on SQ grounds.
The whole point of the bake off was to challenge that statement. Even if just ONE person disagrees, and does it based upon a sensible comparison, then his statement is disproved. Personal preferences are irrelevant in the terms of challenging this assertion.

Over to you...

 

[BE718]

Just to be clear, ST's statement was:



He was quite explicit that no one prefers streaming on SQ grounds.
The whole point of the bake off was to challenge that statement. Even if just ONE person disagrees, and does it based upon a sensible comparison, then his statement is disproved. Personal preferences are irrelevant in the terms of challenging this assertion.

Over to you...

STs statement has no basis. That is purely his opinion. He has a lot of those

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

STs statement has no basis. That is purely his opinion. He has a lot of those

Pretty much everyone anyone says is generally opinion, even if it's a re-stated one, but yes I agree.

As mentioned, the whole point of the idea of the bakeoff was to explore the idea. Have to say, that I understood where he was coming from. Over the years I've heard a number of pretty good CDPs (e.g. Esoteric, Wadia, Naim, DCS etc) and in general was very impressed. Most of the streamers I've heard weren't in the same league. So I really didn't know whether what I use could compete with an Audio Research CDP, which as I've already mentioned, I rather like.
Would have been better to have a wider set of units to try out, but you can't win them all.

 

[BE718]

It does also somewhat depend on how you define streaming.

An all in one unit, or for example one system I use is an MDAC plugged via usb into either a laptop or Raspberry PI. The data is streamed over the network from a NAS. It works very well. The audio quality isnt dictated by the streaming, its dictated by the quality of the DAC. Asynchronous USB has the potential to beat SPDIF connections due to not having to recover the audio clock from the data. Obviously you dont need to do this either in an all in one cd player.

 

[MY NAIM IS GR8T]

Has all music been digitised yet?
I bet most radio stations still use CD players.
Would not most digitised music have been sourced from a CD?

 

[Sibbers]

Has all music been digitised yet?
I bet most radio stations still use CD players.
Would not most digitised music have been sourced from a CD?

Generally, yep. Although much has been ingested, the source is mostly CD for Radio stations and homes. All that's happening really is a comparison of DACs with possible impact of data transport as far as I can tell.

Actually thinking about it, Radio source is probably DAT to file based. Someone here will know.

 

[9designs]

I've not really followed this debate, reading back some of it and the quotes the suggestion from ST was perhaps written just to be provocative? .... Or he was talking from his "Bass port"...

While I tend to hold back voicing on all this, as I have to accept my experience is largely based on one brand.... though that least that gives consistency.
The difference in my view appear more about different generations of DAC technology and their particular voice. Which people like to jump on and claim its due to it being a CDP or a "streamer"

Technically streaming should have advantages over rotating optical disc, certainly not worse. As always it's how something is implemented that maters, am I convinced by the many products and methods about?... hmmm no.

For a single brand comparison back in 2008 I think it was I bought one of the early Linn Akurate DS streamers, and sat it next to my Linn Unidisk 1.1 player. Which I guess would be viewed as the second best CDP Linn ever made, second to the CD12, often said to be one of the best players ?

Anyway the DS streaming just a 16/44.1 file sounded as good as the 1.1 playing a 24 bit SACD or DVD-A.......hence better than when the 1.1 played the original ripped CD.... from then the DS has just got better and better both by software update and hardware upgrades...

For me done right (the Linn way) Streaming works out better.....

Mr_S we have in the past spoke on various forum about a play off.... perhaps you need a little more Linn exposure

 

[73Chaz]

Has all music been digitised yet?
I bet most radio stations still use CD players.
Would not most digitised music have been sourced from a CD?

You think radio stations have a load of people running around in a library picking CDs? Ok...

Back on topic, when I got rid of my CDP, I compared it extensively to DACs playing files. It was impossible to reliably distinguish between sources.

My opinion is that people who prefer CDPs prefer artefacts. But that is just my opinion.

 

[sunbeamgls]

I know many people who have decent system who prefer a streamer over a CDP. So saying nobody likes a streamer in preference to a CDP is not true.

Does this mean all streamers are better than all CDPs? No

Does it mean a CDP can't be better than a streamer? No

Some music players are better than others. Amazing news eh?