Cambridge CD1 2 box player...where's the dacs? pics

[rfbrw]

Originally posted by homemade
This is a picture of the top box. 2 identical boards that have intrgrated components I've never seen before(no markings)

The dacs are probably hidden away somewhere here.

[GJF]

The CD1 used 3 X TDA1541 dacs and a bespoke filter design if memory serves me right, all the work of Stan Curtis I believe.
The integrated components you mention are circuitry that has been 'potted' to keep out prying eyes of those at the time (80's) who would copy any and every innovation and claim it as their own!
I think you will find that the laser assembly is a special design also in that the whole shebang is mounted on an ingenious suspension system which required special hand castings to be made.
The whole machine is, as you claim, very 'handmade'. It needed to be as it sold in low volumes and Stan had his hands in the assembly of most of the machines and I believe his wife was also involved in the project to!
Hope this helps.

Gary.

[homemade]

Originally posted by GJF
The CD1 used 3 X TDA1541 dacs and a bespoke filter design if memory serves me right, all the work of Stan Curtis I believe.
The integrated components you mention are circuitry that has been 'potted' to keep out prying eyes of those at the time (80's) who would copy any and every innovation and claim it as their own!
I think you will find that the laser assembly is a special design also in that the whole shebang is mounted on an ingenious suspension system which required special hand castings to be made.
The whole machine is, as you claim, very 'handmade'. It needed to be as it sold in low volumes and Stan had his hands in the assembly of most of the machines and I believe his wife was also involved in the project to!
Hope this helps.

Gary.

Gary,
Yes , you are most correct. The 2 output boards have 'STAN CURTIS' imprinted on the underside. DOGPILE.COM found me some info , which stated , as you said , 3 1541 dacs(per channel??) with 16X oversampling . All these are encapsulated(potted) to prevent what you mentioned. The conversion fillter selection is most interesting , and I would like to find out more about how it functions. And you are also correct about the elaborate transport system , with it's unique suspension setup. Any idea what this thing sold for back then? I must say that this player sounds very different than all my other vintage Philips based designs. Thank-you for the information.

[GJF]

Back in 1986 this would have cost around £1500!

I'm not surprised in that it sounds different, in its time it was way, way advanced against the then state-of-the-art.
Most Japan made players were sold on the promise of more bits and more oversampling but failed to achieve any of the claims made whilst the CD1 used some original thinking in running in what I think was paralleled dual differential mode.
Hence the number of dacs per channel which possibly accounts for some of the price because at the time they were new and expensive.

[Werner]

AFAIK the first one was thrown together over a Christmas break, Stan B&Eing RadioSpares to get much-needed components (joking), Stan also casting much of the transport metalwork himself because no subcontractor was found wanting to do this (true).

Originally posted by homemade

The conversion fillter selection is most interesting , and I would like to find out more about how it functions.

If you have a 192kHz ADC you can do frequency sweeps and impulse response measurements. That should tell a lot.


W

[veeman]

This machine blows all the modern so called modern high end wannabes out of the water. A closed doors test was done last year in britain with all the highest end expensive cd players and Stan was invited to bring in his machine. No comparison it blew away all the overpriced and overhyped crap out there.