erin
Are you referring to one of those original little WD players that you can currently buy for AU$50 from Officeworks etc due to being discontinued ?
I think you will find that the later WD TV Live HD is much improved on that. The local PC magazines have been giving the WD TV Live HD the thumbs up for some months now.(FWIW !)
I also understand from looking at the WD forums that there have been firmware updates with the more expensive Live player to overcome sound problems. I agree with your other comments about the SMPS, and I did not even bother with trying a HDD with it.
I imagine though, that if I did try a USB HDD with it that the results when using the new 12V 2.5A linear regulated supply that I made especially for it would be considerably better.As regards the quality of the playback when using a USB pen with it, I can only say that the majority of PCs and Macs are not able to rip .wav files that sound as good as a decent CD player anyway.Perhaps that is the reason why the HiFace is so popular, with its jitter correction abilities ?
SandyK
P.S.
Don't forget that PSU electrolytics can take several days to fully form, and SQ may be up and down in cycles for some time.
You really need to give it more time, although that little earlier model may never do a great deal better.
Yes its the $50 one from office(doesnt)work(s)!!
I really fail to see how the one with network capabilities would sound better considering the extra switching noise. Unless of course it has a completely different chipset and embedded controller?? Do you know about this?
I wouldn't give too much credit to a PC magazines review of the sound quality though. Although as a video player it seems to be of exceptional value @ $50.
Anyway, I will give it a bit longer, and if it starts to sound better, I will certainly report the results, as I have no interest in false reporting. I just say it how I hear it.
I sort of wonder why any other NMT or media player would sound that much better though? I mean why? they are all just designed as video players with a bit of audio decoding thrown in. They are not designed as audio specialist devices (except for the squeezebox - which I have not heard)
Which ultimately is the purpose of this thread, to see if people are interested in a specialist low jitter audiophile HDD audio player. That sounds really genuinely good.
Sorry if what I wrote sounds nasty, its just a discussion and no offense is intended. Comments and opinions are welcomed.
With regards,
Erin
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Hi,
I take it the poll is yours?
You are omitting the most relevant answer - "Been there, done that, got the T-Shirt!".
I have been using over the last five years or so two custom build and two off the shelf computers for music replay (among others).
First was an off the shelf Windows MCE PC under the "Advent" brand purchased very cheaply from a "surplus" vendor. I used to run this with a prototype of the AMR CD-77 player (via USB) using Winamp, Ochtan ASIO Plugin, Ploytech USB ASIO Driver and a remote control program for my windows smartphone (basically what a lot of people do now with iPhones and iTunes, boy, that stuff is SO 2005!).
This machine thought me a lot about noise control and noise issues in PC's.
Having learned all this I rehoused the Motherboard into a Silverstone LC-11 Case with VFD with new hard drives and all sorts of tweaks for a really quiet PC with a very powerful single core CPU, custom build. Rest of setup like above. Later I played with early CMP versions on this platform with various HW configs.
My next box was again off the shelf, a closeout Asus Mini PC (think Mac Mini, but PC Platform and using Low Heat Pentium Mobile CPU). For a while I used a M-Audio Firewire Card (SPDIF out to a Non-OS TDA-1541 DAC), later I figured out how to get the on-board to output bitperfect audio via SPDIF and how to modify the motherboard SPDIF system for decent jitter performance.
As I disliked CMP's ergonomics (WHAT ERGONOMICS!?) I eventually hit on customised Media Portal with ASIO Music Player (sounds as good as CMP, without the PITA user interface) and Media Slayer as Ripper. MCE Remote.
This machine is now in my office. Runs Album Player (seriously start liking it) into async USB Dac (modded musiland Monitor 01 US). Plays music via delvolo powerline network connection from the main music server HDD (main server below).
My current Music PC is build around a OrigenAE S16T Case with a 7" Touchscreen. Uses a fanless 1GHz Via PCB, Pico PSU (fanless) and external power brick. Halve a terrorbyte in hardware raid0.
The output is Via (pun intended) modified MB SPDIF or Asynchronous USB to SPDIF (heavily modded Musiland) or USB to AMR CD-Players.
Software for now Mediaportal/Asio Music Player/Mediaslayer plus FUPPES to serve up the music to a modified Linksys wireless "Ghettoblaster" in the bedroom and network sharing to the Office Album Player PC.
Generally, if serving multiroom use there is no serious listening going on, so no impact on SQ..
The most recent Setup I did used a MSI Wind Nettop, external USB HDD, MCE Remote and again my usual Mediaportal setup.
All in all quite a few T-Shirts.
I suspect eventually we get something like the iPad mated with a WDTV etc hardware device that plays of any sort of source. Sadly all current hardware solutions that omit the PC seriously suck on accessability of HQ datstreams, usability and so on.
Mac's are now majorly lagging behind PC systems for HD and HQ Audio (they had a headstart as the ASRC in OSX was better than that in Windows but lost ground rapidly).
Leaves only a PC.
Les than 1K USD buys a MSI Wind Nettop with a big touchscreen, MCE remote, external one terrorbyte Hard drive and Musiland or Highface USB to SPDIF converter. Modify the USB-2-SPDIF converter, install Album Player and you will beating any CD-transport out there, CEC TL0 not excepted on SQ.
Ciao T
I take it the poll is yours?
You are omitting the most relevant answer - "Been there, done that, got the T-Shirt!".
I have been using over the last five years or so two custom build and two off the shelf computers for music replay (among others).
First was an off the shelf Windows MCE PC under the "Advent" brand purchased very cheaply from a "surplus" vendor. I used to run this with a prototype of the AMR CD-77 player (via USB) using Winamp, Ochtan ASIO Plugin, Ploytech USB ASIO Driver and a remote control program for my windows smartphone (basically what a lot of people do now with iPhones and iTunes, boy, that stuff is SO 2005!).
This machine thought me a lot about noise control and noise issues in PC's.
Having learned all this I rehoused the Motherboard into a Silverstone LC-11 Case with VFD with new hard drives and all sorts of tweaks for a really quiet PC with a very powerful single core CPU, custom build. Rest of setup like above. Later I played with early CMP versions on this platform with various HW configs.
My next box was again off the shelf, a closeout Asus Mini PC (think Mac Mini, but PC Platform and using Low Heat Pentium Mobile CPU). For a while I used a M-Audio Firewire Card (SPDIF out to a Non-OS TDA-1541 DAC), later I figured out how to get the on-board to output bitperfect audio via SPDIF and how to modify the motherboard SPDIF system for decent jitter performance.
As I disliked CMP's ergonomics (WHAT ERGONOMICS!?) I eventually hit on customised Media Portal with ASIO Music Player (sounds as good as CMP, without the PITA user interface) and Media Slayer as Ripper. MCE Remote.
This machine is now in my office. Runs Album Player (seriously start liking it) into async USB Dac (modded musiland Monitor 01 US). Plays music via delvolo powerline network connection from the main music server HDD (main server below).
My current Music PC is build around a OrigenAE S16T Case with a 7" Touchscreen. Uses a fanless 1GHz Via PCB, Pico PSU (fanless) and external power brick. Halve a terrorbyte in hardware raid0.
The output is Via (pun intended) modified MB SPDIF or Asynchronous USB to SPDIF (heavily modded Musiland) or USB to AMR CD-Players.
Software for now Mediaportal/Asio Music Player/Mediaslayer plus FUPPES to serve up the music to a modified Linksys wireless "Ghettoblaster" in the bedroom and network sharing to the Office Album Player PC.
Generally, if serving multiroom use there is no serious listening going on, so no impact on SQ..
The most recent Setup I did used a MSI Wind Nettop, external USB HDD, MCE Remote and again my usual Mediaportal setup.
All in all quite a few T-Shirts.
I suspect eventually we get something like the iPad mated with a WDTV etc hardware device that plays of any sort of source. Sadly all current hardware solutions that omit the PC seriously suck on accessability of HQ datstreams, usability and so on.
Mac's are now majorly lagging behind PC systems for HD and HQ Audio (they had a headstart as the ASRC in OSX was better than that in Windows but lost ground rapidly).
Leaves only a PC.
Les than 1K USD buys a MSI Wind Nettop with a big touchscreen, MCE remote, external one terrorbyte Hard drive and Musiland or Highface USB to SPDIF converter. Modify the USB-2-SPDIF converter, install Album Player and you will beating any CD-transport out there, CEC TL0 not excepted on SQ.
Ciao T
Give me a music player that looks like a hifi component and not a PC! I don't want to have a monitor, keyboard or mouse cluttering up the place, nor do I care to fuss with antivirus software or mandatory software updates when I only wanted to listen to some tunes. Give me a robust filesystem that doesn't need periodic defragmentation. Put a ordinary on/off button and regular player and navigation buttons on the front panel. For more advanced configuration, a built-in web interface would be fine. Come to think of it, a Squeezebox + Squeeze Server integrated into a single box would come pretty close.
Hi,
How is my driving?
No Keyboard. No Mouse. No Monitor (Okay, attached to TV, but only because the only space in the current AV furniture is too low to use). Full remote via a handset that matches standard AV types and which the GF has zero problems with.
No AV on this machine either. Software updates set to "just don't" and it still has no virus despite running windows and having internet access (Freedb, Amazon Coverart etc.).
Fragmentation is the price paid for efficient space use and writing files at different times after deleting others. If you only ever add to a NTFS formatted Drive and never delete or change files, it does not fragment. Neither does the stuff under DOS, come to think of it, of OSX or 'nux. And if you do, they all fragment and need defragmenting. Some do this behind the scenes in idle time, as in fact can windows.
Yup, got that via touchscreen softbuttons.
All of the buttons, not just the basics.
Includes single button ripping to flac with coverart as well.
Also includes lastfm scrobbler.
Does VNC count? Full remote screen/mouse/keyboard control over the network in a window on my laptop if needed!
Hardly. The navigation and display is prehistoric at best!
The only way where it beats my ancient linksys boombox is that the display is VFD instead of LCD and bigger. The rest is as bad!
So, where I stand a custom PC delivers all you ask and WAY better than the SB or it's ilk ever will. Apple iPad may have a look in.
Ciao T
How is my driving?
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
No Keyboard. No Mouse. No Monitor (Okay, attached to TV, but only because the only space in the current AV furniture is too low to use). Full remote via a handset that matches standard AV types and which the GF has zero problems with.
No AV on this machine either. Software updates set to "just don't" and it still has no virus despite running windows and having internet access (Freedb, Amazon Coverart etc.).
Fragmentation is the price paid for efficient space use and writing files at different times after deleting others. If you only ever add to a NTFS formatted Drive and never delete or change files, it does not fragment. Neither does the stuff under DOS, come to think of it, of OSX or 'nux. And if you do, they all fragment and need defragmenting. Some do this behind the scenes in idle time, as in fact can windows.
Yup, got that via touchscreen softbuttons.
All of the buttons, not just the basics.
Includes single button ripping to flac with coverart as well.
Also includes lastfm scrobbler.
Does VNC count? Full remote screen/mouse/keyboard control over the network in a window on my laptop if needed!
Hardly. The navigation and display is prehistoric at best!
The only way where it beats my ancient linksys boombox is that the display is VFD instead of LCD and bigger. The rest is as bad!
So, where I stand a custom PC delivers all you ask and WAY better than the SB or it's ilk ever will. Apple iPad may have a look in.
Ciao T
ripping to USB pen
erin
It's a very contentious issue that I will not go further into here,
but I disable the motherboard pulsed front HDD fan during ripping,
and have gone to a lot of trouble with fan decoupling using rubber mounts,
and substantially reduced noise and vibration with the use of 3M 2552 adhesive anti vibration tape on key areas including HDDs and LG BR writer, and especially around the SMPS .The PC is now VERY much quieter audibly as well.
SandyK
3M? Damping Foil 2552
erin
It's a very contentious issue that I will not go further into here,
but I disable the motherboard pulsed front HDD fan during ripping,
and have gone to a lot of trouble with fan decoupling using rubber mounts,
and substantially reduced noise and vibration with the use of 3M 2552 adhesive anti vibration tape on key areas including HDDs and LG BR writer, and especially around the SMPS .The PC is now VERY much quieter audibly as well.
SandyK
3M? Damping Foil 2552
Not bad! Can you eliminate the Windows desktop entirely so that the user never sees anything but the music player app? I want my computer to be non-computerish, no Start menu etc.
Hi,
That is exactly what I have done. Using custom wallpapers (including boot) and the "Touchhide cursor" there is nothing visible of windows at all, no boot screens, nothing.
As I boot the Via board using it's logo-screen all the text bits on startup are also hidden. Power consumption is so low I leave the unit all the time.
I can drop into Windows if I have to do any housekeeping for the music datebase or the like, but doing that is very rare.
Ciao T
That is exactly what I have done. Using custom wallpapers (including boot) and the "Touchhide cursor" there is nothing visible of windows at all, no boot screens, nothing.
As I boot the Via board using it's logo-screen all the text bits on startup are also hidden. Power consumption is so low I leave the unit all the time.
I can drop into Windows if I have to do any housekeeping for the music datebase or the like, but doing that is very rare.
Ciao T
Hi,
Sure. As everything is integrated into the motherboard there is not much to see though, except ton's of empty space...
Ciao T
Sure. As everything is integrated into the motherboard there is not much to see though, except ton's of empty space...
Ciao T
Attachments
Nice work, is none of this kit custom? How does the display and remote work?
I agree with you about the squeezebox, a laptop to drive a vnc server is a better solution.
Hi,
Custom parts are that I fitted an old (XP supported) MCE Remote receiver inside and modified the motherboards audio section (not really visible). Plus all the power wiring etc..
The display is VGA 16:10 with a USB (internal connection) touch surface.
The remote is a Philips OEM'ed MCE Remote (quite stylish and with white backlight I may add):
Most media playback software (excluding CMP^2) supports the MCE remote, if it is not supported software exists that can map the MCE remote commands to key-strokes.
The MCE Remote also has learning buttons (Volume and TV Power) so I can control the Preamp Volume and my projector from the MCE Remote. Yup, I have a Projector attached (with automated electrical screen) and use this Box as Video/DVD Player (SD only, but my projector is also SD, so what?).
The software I use (Mediaportal) has a nice skin with CD-Coverflow:
This can be navigated fine from the remote or touchscreen.
The remote supports T9 (cellphone numberpad text entry) style entry to jump to specific CD's or genre folders. Very easy to use.
Ciao T
Custom parts are that I fitted an old (XP supported) MCE Remote receiver inside and modified the motherboards audio section (not really visible). Plus all the power wiring etc..
The display is VGA 16:10 with a USB (internal connection) touch surface.
The remote is a Philips OEM'ed MCE Remote (quite stylish and with white backlight I may add):
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Most media playback software (excluding CMP^2) supports the MCE remote, if it is not supported software exists that can map the MCE remote commands to key-strokes.
The MCE Remote also has learning buttons (Volume and TV Power) so I can control the Preamp Volume and my projector from the MCE Remote. Yup, I have a Projector attached (with automated electrical screen) and use this Box as Video/DVD Player (SD only, but my projector is also SD, so what?).
The software I use (Mediaportal) has a nice skin with CD-Coverflow:
This can be navigated fine from the remote or touchscreen.
The remote supports T9 (cellphone numberpad text entry) style entry to jump to specific CD's or genre folders. Very easy to use.
Ciao T
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I've been using a late G4 Powerbook for a while. It has optical out via the headphone socket. They're not expensive to buy 2nd hand (a good one is £300 - £400 on eBay), so that deals with the Mac/cost issue. They're also quite neat and, of course, no need for a separate screen.
A MacBook would be similar and give you the added benefit (hollow laugh) of being able to run Windows.
A MacBook would be similar and give you the added benefit (hollow laugh) of being able to run Windows.
Hi,
And you need to pay loads of extra money if you want to play FLAC and have a bitperfect output.
Right now Mac's are a quite poor platform for high performance audio (and iTunes is useless), mainly because of the closed nature of the system, compared to windows. Say whatever bad you will about Windows and M$ (and I'll join you in badmouthing M$ and Windows), but the relatively open nature compared to Mac means there is a lot more good software for it.
While I dislike CMP^2 ergonomics, it must be considered one of THE benchmarks for "Computer Transport" Sound Quality and is "Windows only". Of course, you can pay 995 USD for Amarra to get the same on a Mac.
Ciao T
And you need to pay loads of extra money if you want to play FLAC and have a bitperfect output.
Right now Mac's are a quite poor platform for high performance audio (and iTunes is useless), mainly because of the closed nature of the system, compared to windows. Say whatever bad you will about Windows and M$ (and I'll join you in badmouthing M$ and Windows), but the relatively open nature compared to Mac means there is a lot more good software for it.
While I dislike CMP^2 ergonomics, it must be considered one of THE benchmarks for "Computer Transport" Sound Quality and is "Windows only". Of course, you can pay 995 USD for Amarra to get the same on a Mac.
Ciao T
This is why Thorsten gets the gig of designing beautiful sounding equipment. I'm certainly a bit envious.
Hi Thorsten,
Yes I started the poll.
Can I ask for your opinion.
I suspect that reducing the overheads of the windows operating system has the greatest effect on the quality of the sound, after doing this, is there much difference in the sound quality of Mediaportal vs cPlay +CMP.
Thanks
Erin
Hi,
In my system and setup the differences between the two are below what I can easily percieve.
I do not use any form of resampling, digital filtering etc. in my system.
Full system here:
Audio Asylum - Inmate Systems - Thorsten's diyhifi system
Ciao T
In my system and setup the differences between the two are below what I can easily percieve.
I do not use any form of resampling, digital filtering etc. in my system.
Full system here:
Audio Asylum - Inmate Systems - Thorsten's diyhifi system
Ciao T
And you need to pay loads of extra money if you want to play FLAC and have a bitperfect output.
Right now Mac's are a quite poor platform for high performance audio (and iTunes is useless), mainly because of the closed nature of the system, compared to windows. Say whatever bad you will about Windows and M$ (and I'll join you in badmouthing M$ and Windows), but the relatively open nature compared to Mac means there is a lot more good software for it.
While I dislike CMP^2 ergonomics, it must be considered one of THE benchmarks for "Computer Transport" Sound Quality and is "Windows only". Of course, you can pay 995 USD for Amarra to get the same on a Mac.
T, where u been sleepin' man....??
You were surely taking the **** saying that Mac's are poor platform for high performance audio right....
The majority of professional music producers/engineers/mastering eng's who depend on a computer for a living AND recording-playback quality DON'T f*ck with Windows... life is waaay too short ;-)
Anybody can have slick, (near)zero hassle Studio Master fidelity playback system with under $500 of drive gear, minus DAC of course...
-Used Macbook ~$250
-Pure Music 24/192 Bit Perfect, Auto Sample rate Switching Software $129
+Pure Music
-M2Tech hiFace 24/192 USB->SPDIF thumb sized interface $99
+M2Tech
-Your favourite dac $100-$100,000 !
The astute ripper will employ the studio standard AIFF file format to suffer zero decoding processor overhead (i.e: sounds mo' better !), and which also most importantly fully supports embedded album art and meta-data tagging for hassle free importing.
For the many online sources who only offer higher res. files in FLAC format, XLD is a particularly fine OS X free-ware program which will re-encode FLAC to AIFF and automatically load into them iTunes supporting with all tags intact.
X Lossless Decoder: Lossless audio decoder for Mac OS X
Throw in an iPod Touch for ~$250, and you have an incredibly comprehensive wi-fi remote control WITH full artwork viewing, which is easy enough for a 7 year old to operate...
All up, for well under $1k you can include a cool dac, terrabytes of storage and a bucketload of wicked hi-res downloads from your favourite website, ala: Linn, Channel Classics, whomever..
The operative words here are (near)Zero hassle.
I spend an inordinate amount of time working in audio production... with both of the main computer platforms in use today, neither are bulletproof but all I can suggest to anybody is that if the enjoyment of high fidelity music is their primary interest rather than tooling with computers, take the easier route and get a M@C, either that or get PROPER serious and get a decent turntable
Right now Mac's are a quite poor platform for high performance audio (and iTunes is useless), mainly because of the closed nature of the system, compared to windows. Say whatever bad you will about Windows and M$ (and I'll join you in badmouthing M$ and Windows), but the relatively open nature compared to Mac means there is a lot more good software for it.
While I dislike CMP^2 ergonomics, it must be considered one of THE benchmarks for "Computer Transport" Sound Quality and is "Windows only". Of course, you can pay 995 USD for Amarra to get the same on a Mac.
T, where u been sleepin' man....??
You were surely taking the **** saying that Mac's are poor platform for high performance audio right....
The majority of professional music producers/engineers/mastering eng's who depend on a computer for a living AND recording-playback quality DON'T f*ck with Windows... life is waaay too short ;-)
Anybody can have slick, (near)zero hassle Studio Master fidelity playback system with under $500 of drive gear, minus DAC of course...
-Used Macbook ~$250
-Pure Music 24/192 Bit Perfect, Auto Sample rate Switching Software $129
+Pure Music
-M2Tech hiFace 24/192 USB->SPDIF thumb sized interface $99
+M2Tech
-Your favourite dac $100-$100,000 !
The astute ripper will employ the studio standard AIFF file format to suffer zero decoding processor overhead (i.e: sounds mo' better !), and which also most importantly fully supports embedded album art and meta-data tagging for hassle free importing.
For the many online sources who only offer higher res. files in FLAC format, XLD is a particularly fine OS X free-ware program which will re-encode FLAC to AIFF and automatically load into them iTunes supporting with all tags intact.
X Lossless Decoder: Lossless audio decoder for Mac OS X
Throw in an iPod Touch for ~$250, and you have an incredibly comprehensive wi-fi remote control WITH full artwork viewing, which is easy enough for a 7 year old to operate...
All up, for well under $1k you can include a cool dac, terrabytes of storage and a bucketload of wicked hi-res downloads from your favourite website, ala: Linn, Channel Classics, whomever..
The operative words here are (near)Zero hassle.
I spend an inordinate amount of time working in audio production... with both of the main computer platforms in use today, neither are bulletproof but all I can suggest to anybody is that if the enjoyment of high fidelity music is their primary interest rather than tooling with computers, take the easier route and get a M@C, either that or get PROPER serious and get a decent turntable
Hi,
Last time I looked at Pure Music it was barely weeks old and reported by many as quite buggy. That was maybe two weeks ago. So I think the Jury is still out.
Amarra is a little more mature but very expensive.
What other choices can you suggest for Mac's?
Off hand, decent ASIO capable software for PC is zero to very little, without trying I can mention:
AlbumPlayer (35$)
CMP^2 (Free)
Foobar 2K (Free)
J-River Media Jukebox (Free)
Mediaportal/ASIOMP (Free)
Kristall (Free)
Winamp (Free)
A 2nd Hand Notebook to run these can be had for much less than anything with the fashionable apple on it (the apple costs extra) and if we exclude CMP and MP/ASIOMP hassle-free to set up and run. And if you must, most/all of the above can be controlled via iPhones or the superior alternatives.
Ciao T
Last time I looked at Pure Music it was barely weeks old and reported by many as quite buggy. That was maybe two weeks ago. So I think the Jury is still out.
Amarra is a little more mature but very expensive.
What other choices can you suggest for Mac's?
Off hand, decent ASIO capable software for PC is zero to very little, without trying I can mention:
AlbumPlayer (35$)
CMP^2 (Free)
Foobar 2K (Free)
J-River Media Jukebox (Free)
Mediaportal/ASIOMP (Free)
Kristall (Free)
Winamp (Free)
A 2nd Hand Notebook to run these can be had for much less than anything with the fashionable apple on it (the apple costs extra) and if we exclude CMP and MP/ASIOMP hassle-free to set up and run. And if you must, most/all of the above can be controlled via iPhones or the superior alternatives.
Ciao T
T, where u been sleepin' man....??
You were surely taking the **** saying that Mac's are poor platform for high performance audio right....
The majority of professional music producers/engineers/mastering eng's who depend on a computer for a living AND recording-playback quality DON'T f*ck with Windows... life is waaay too short ;-)
Coolhandluc, I would like to comment on some of your points, mainly about professional recording/ equipment.
Professional multitrack recording software, pro tools etc. is designed to replicate the functions of a traditional analog mixing desk, tape recorder, and effects sends, all in a convieneient package, all on your mac/pc.
Its very cool, in fact its really amazing that anyone can have a full high quality recording studio in their own home, for under $3000 ? including interface.
But some people assume that pro-audio equipment is always better than domestic hi-fi equipment.
Pro-audio equipment can be just as bad sounding as anything out there.
Pro-audio equipment has certain criteria to meet when its being designed.
It must mount in a rack.
It must have balanced inputs and outputs.
It must have signal level meters.
It must be rugged and withstand being transported / dropped in rack cases.
It must be a work-horse.
Price vs. the many competing products doing the same thing, is a consideration.
After all these other criteria, frequently the sound quality comes secondary.
Domestic hi-fi equipment has similar criteria, (and yes there is plenty of bad sounding domestic equipment.)
It must look nice in the lounge room,
It must have unbalanced in/outputs.
But, when we are talking about real hi-fi.
It is designed primarily to provide the listener with the highest form of audio reproduction.
The same comes down to software, pro tools, cubase etc. Is designed to do what it does -multitrack recording.
Software like CMP + cPlay and the like, were designed with one purpose in mind to offer the highest possible audio reproduction. When used on a computer optimised for audio, nothing else comes close.
I would not use pro-tools for playing back music on my hi-fi. (although if listening to a modern recording - I probably am.)
You made the point that if one is really serious, one should play LP's.
Perhaps you are saying that you like the sound of analog recordings. Fair enough, so do I.
Perhaps this is because the analog recording process, sounds better than pro tools on a Mac?
Perhaps there is too much processing (overheads) going on when using multitrack recording software?
Perhaps someone should develop, a bare bones multitrack recording software along the lines of CMP + cPlay. Primarily with audio quality in mind?
Pro vs. Domestic, there is good and bad equipment out there, as always, one needs to use their ears.
Comments are welcome
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