DAC Upgrade for older Carver CD Player: LC7881-C DAC

M_Anker · 21st November 2001, 12:54 PM

Has anyone tried upgrading the DAC chip in their CD player, and if so, did you notice a difference in the sound? My Cd player is a 12 year old Carver TL-3100, and it has been an excellent unit. Recently, I have installed an LClock XO2, AD-825 op-amps, and Black Gate & Hovland capacitors in the analog stage. Right now, the unit sounds great, but in the pursuit of HiFi from "junk" I would like to make it a little better.

The chip currently in the player is a: LC7881-C made by Sanyo.

The question is, does anyone know of a DAC that is compatible pin-for-pin that would improve the sound?

If so, where is the best place to purchase the chip so that I don't have to buy a thousand of them?

Would a chip with a newer date code possibly have an improved sound?

Thanks in advance!

-M.A.

basil · 21st November 2001, 05:55 PM

Well, if your player is about 12 years old the best thing is to try to build a s/pdif output and build a new external DAC altogether. The new DAC chips are miles ahead. Check out Burr-Brown, Crystal, Analogue devices or just do a search. There's tons of stuff out there.
If you still insist on working on the Carver you should check out The Marantz Mods on TNT-audio website done by Thorsten Loesch. The work he did on the digital section was very good. Beef up your power supply, replace the rectifying diodes with hexfreds or schottky, you could replace the signal path (hf) from the laser to the decoder with miniature coax (rg-178-50 ohm) I did and that was pretty good. Also beef up the decoupling chips around the decoder and other important chips the idea is lowering the noise floor. And finally you could build seperate power supplies for the different sections. Or, check out Jon Risch's site and build yourself an AC conditioner and clean up the power to your player. That was one of the best things I did. Good Luck!

Will · 11th December 2001, 12:02 PM

basil,
do you have the link to Jon Risch's site ? thanks

will.

basil · 11th December 2001, 11:45 PM

Here ya go Will,

http://www.geocities.com/jonrisch/

21st November 2001, 05:55 PM	#2
basil diyAudio Member Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Montreal Quebec	DAC upgrade Well, if your player is about 12 years old the best thing is to try to build a s/pdif output and build a new external DAC altogether. The new DAC chips are miles ahead. Check out Burr-Brown, Crystal, Analogue devices or just do a search. There's tons of stuff out there. If you still insist on working on the Carver you should check out The Marantz Mods on TNT-audio website done by Thorsten Loesch. The work he did on the digital section was very good. Beef up your power supply, replace the rectifying diodes with hexfreds or schottky, you could replace the signal path (hf) from the laser to the decoder with miniature coax (rg-178-50 ohm) I did and that was pretty good. Also beef up the decoupling chips around the decoder and other important chips the idea is lowering the noise floor. And finally you could build seperate power supplies for the different sections. Or, check out Jon Risch's site and build yourself an AC conditioner and clean up the power to your player. That was one of the best things I did. Good Luck!

11th December 2001, 11:45 PM	#4
basil diyAudio Member Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Montreal Quebec	Risch's web site Here ya go Will, http://www.geocities.com/jonrisch/

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21st November 2001, 12:54 PM	#1
M_Anker diyAudio Member Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Cambridge, OH. USA	Has anyone tried upgrading the DAC chip in their CD player, and if so, did you notice a difference in the sound? My Cd player is a 12 year old Carver TL-3100, and it has been an excellent unit. Recently, I have installed an LClock XO2, AD-825 op-amps, and Black Gate & Hovland capacitors in the analog stage. Right now, the unit sounds great, but in the pursuit of HiFi from "junk" I would like to make it a little better. The chip currently in the player is a: LC7881-C made by Sanyo. The question is, does anyone know of a DAC that is compatible pin-for-pin that would improve the sound? If so, where is the best place to purchase the chip so that I don't have to buy a thousand of them? Would a chip with a newer date code possibly have an improved sound? Thanks in advance! -M.A.

11th December 2001, 12:02 PM	#3
Will diyAudio Member Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Kuala Lumpur	basil, do you have the link to Jon Risch's site ? thanks will.

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