Okay i spend some money on better regs and a clock few caps here and there,and get what i want.Which is what were all after ive heard ten grand players and was not impressed i know the 63 has more potential than all of this new junk.easy to work with giving great gains.we are all limited by what sony and philips did in the 80s 44.1 so lets extract whats availabe .
alan
alan
Here here.
I just want you to know I was not questioning your judgment in any way. Your clearly an experienced guy and have at least heard good 63 KI's and tweaked std 63's.
I have NOT - I have no idea what one sounds like - period.
I just thought....£1000......holy sh..
Probably like many others reading this.
It's a lot of money Alan - I hope you get exactly what you want from this project and look forward to watching it unfold.
Andrew
I just want you to know I was not questioning your judgment in any way. Your clearly an experienced guy and have at least heard good 63 KI's and tweaked std 63's.
I have NOT - I have no idea what one sounds like - period.
I just thought....£1000......holy sh..
Probably like many others reading this.
It's a lot of money Alan - I hope you get exactly what you want from this project and look forward to watching it unfold.
Andrew
thanks for your vote andew we all have ears its what ever floats ur boat were all after audio nivanna hope my quest unfolds
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No, I think the vast majority of the population here are looking for a damn good player for as little outlay as possible, it's a long shot but I'm guessing they're not interested in how many 'super regs' have been grafted in or how expensive the output caps are or in fact, how many black gates have been sourced and applied. They're more interested in tracing and rectifying the mistakes/short cuts that the original topology has to offer and advancing not with 'boutique' bits and bobs but in time/effort and 'tweaking' this and that to conclude an output that is more pleasing to the ear rather than aiming for a complete 'forum/pub talk' part list.
Really? I've heard players of less than 10 times that to my ears sounded superb.
New junk? Contrary to what you have read on this thread, there are far better players out there as a starting platform, sorry 63 guys but without a doubt there are.
Philips maybe being the 'red book' but technology has progressed since the 80's, things can only and will get better through time, nobody produces a player that's worse than 'last years' model or they wouldn't sell.
I'll leave this post on a note... How many multi £k 'giant' players are full of 'discrete regs' and independent psu's for every circuit?
Ps, As previous no offence should be taken, it is merely my own humble opinion, an no, not a single cd63 was harmed in the making of this post.
Good night.
No, I think the vast majority of the population here are looking for a damn good player for as little outlay as possible, it's a long shot but I'm guessing they're not interested in how many 'super regs' have been grafted in or how expensive the output caps are or in fact, how many black gates have been sourced and applied. They're more interested in tracing and rectifying the mistakes/short cuts that the original topology has to offer and advancing not with 'boutique' bits and bobs but in time/effort and 'tweaking' this and that to conclude an output that is more pleasing to the ear rather than aiming for a complete 'forum/pub talk' part list.
Really? I've heard players of less than 10 times that to my ears sounded superb.oops sorry opened a can of worms
New junk? Contrary to what you have read on this thread, there are far better players out there as a starting platform, sorry 63 guys but without a doubt there are.
Philips maybe being the 'red book' but technology has progressed since the 80's, things can only and will get better through time, nobody produces a player that's worse than 'last years' model or they wouldn't sell.
I'll leave this post on a note... How many multi £k 'giant' players are full of 'discrete regs' and independent psu's for every circuit?
Ps, As previous no offence should be taken, it is merely my own humble opinion, an no, not a single cd63 was harmed in the making of this post.
Good night.
£40 is cheap no doubt, but I think it will take more than as you say a few £ss on top of that to so called 'beat' the £10k players.
Where does this 'beat the £10k' player quote originate from anyhow? It is used quite frequently in this thread.
OK, there's probably been a few sweeping statements made but we're all in different arene'a here.
Alan has the money spare to have a real blast - not many of us have that kind of ' disposable ' to play with - good on yer Alan - wish it was me tbh.
We all interpret what hits our ears in different ways and no two people hear the same things. We we all spot a bit of quality, accuracy and detail in different ways too. Look how SimonT has moved away from the core of this thread to persue another sound that suits him ( and I ) better.
We all ' do our music ' for different reasons and mod our own stuff with varying expectations.
What's crap to me is fantastic to someone else - I think that's the point I'm making here
How can I impose my personal opinions on anyone in relation to what hits my brain, soul and emotions....how many of you listen to Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Trio in A minor, Op. 50 for piano, violin, and cello ?
I can guess........NONE of you.
But I DO because I try to play the piano like that and absolutely love it.
You'd all tell me it was boring, no midrange or bass or something.
I'm looking for different things - I want to hear 3 tons of tension in piano strings and pedals moving - yes...rediculous I know and £1000 might just take me 3 feet closer to the mic that recorded it.
It's all personal - I know what I want - Alan know exactly what he wants and there is not a damn thing we can say to change his mindset or thought process - I understand this
Tchaikovsky ROCKS
Alan has the money spare to have a real blast - not many of us have that kind of ' disposable ' to play with - good on yer Alan - wish it was me tbh.
We all interpret what hits our ears in different ways and no two people hear the same things. We we all spot a bit of quality, accuracy and detail in different ways too. Look how SimonT has moved away from the core of this thread to persue another sound that suits him ( and I ) better.
We all ' do our music ' for different reasons and mod our own stuff with varying expectations.
What's crap to me is fantastic to someone else - I think that's the point I'm making here
How can I impose my personal opinions on anyone in relation to what hits my brain, soul and emotions....how many of you listen to Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Trio in A minor, Op. 50 for piano, violin, and cello ?
I can guess........NONE of you.
But I DO because I try to play the piano like that and absolutely love it.
You'd all tell me it was boring, no midrange or bass or something.
I'm looking for different things - I want to hear 3 tons of tension in piano strings and pedals moving - yes...rediculous I know and £1000 might just take me 3 feet closer to the mic that recorded it.
It's all personal - I know what I want - Alan know exactly what he wants and there is not a damn thing we can say to change his mindset or thought process - I understand this
Tchaikovsky ROCKS
Well you all know we upgrade lots of different cd player, CD94, CD17KI, SA7S1, CD6003, SA8003, Naim cdps, CA cdps DCS dacs etc etc
Every single one of those cd players is better than the CD63 to start with no doubt. But when pushing the player far they all have a bottle neck and struggle to improve. This bottle neck comes in different guises with different players. The CD67 and CD17KI use the same decoder chip and this seems to cause ultimate detail to be held back. Of course you can spend quite a bit of money before this happens.
When my customers ring up and ask what cd player should I buy to have upgraded I firstly ask what their budget is for the player and then for upgrades. Based around this I often recommend the CD17KI, or the CD6003 and add a few hundred pounds for upgrade. If they say over the next year or two they want to push a cdp far I then recommend the 63 because of what can be achieved.
When talking about 'boutique' they should always be added after the basics are sorted out first. Otherwise you will not get the best from them. With regard the 63 fitting lots of regs and adding lots of psus is doing what £4K+ cd players do and that's isolating the power rails and we all know the psu in the 63 is crap. Sorting this out makes a world of difference.
I take home a lot of the 'better' players to test on my home system as it is better than the works setup and when one does better my 63 I will buy one and swap all the bits over, but up to now nothing comes close. Even the SA-7S1 with a £1K upgrade fell short, having said that it was fantastic. But you need to spend £2.5K+ to buy one and then the cost of upgrades.
We go to audio shows run by the Chester group and help out Inspire Hifi (turntables). I take my cd player along with me to give demos of it. Last year to the dismay of Bob at Inspire it sounded better than his Eclipse 12" deck (£2.8K) running a SME 12" arm (£3K) Ortofon cartridge (£3K) and Whest phono stage (£3.5K) thats a total of £12.3K and all award winners. Both items ran into a ATC SIA2-150 amp and ATC SCM-40 speakers. On A/B comparisons running the same album Jennifer Warnes - The Hunter (his favorite) he picked my cd player 5x out of 5 as the vinyl source. Oh how I laughed.
Not many people have heard a 63 or any cdp to that matter heavily modded, and I understand it is hard to comprehend. Anyone who hears my player cannot believe it is a 63 making that sound. I know it's not really a 63 anymore but a 63 chip set sat under all the psus
But going back to whats been said a CD6003 etc is better than a 63 off the shelf (of course it costs more to buy).
Brent
Every single one of those cd players is better than the CD63 to start with no doubt. But when pushing the player far they all have a bottle neck and struggle to improve. This bottle neck comes in different guises with different players. The CD67 and CD17KI use the same decoder chip and this seems to cause ultimate detail to be held back. Of course you can spend quite a bit of money before this happens.
When my customers ring up and ask what cd player should I buy to have upgraded I firstly ask what their budget is for the player and then for upgrades. Based around this I often recommend the CD17KI, or the CD6003 and add a few hundred pounds for upgrade. If they say over the next year or two they want to push a cdp far I then recommend the 63 because of what can be achieved.
When talking about 'boutique' they should always be added after the basics are sorted out first. Otherwise you will not get the best from them. With regard the 63 fitting lots of regs and adding lots of psus is doing what £4K+ cd players do and that's isolating the power rails and we all know the psu in the 63 is crap. Sorting this out makes a world of difference.
I take home a lot of the 'better' players to test on my home system as it is better than the works setup and when one does better my 63 I will buy one and swap all the bits over, but up to now nothing comes close. Even the SA-7S1 with a £1K upgrade fell short, having said that it was fantastic. But you need to spend £2.5K+ to buy one and then the cost of upgrades.
We go to audio shows run by the Chester group and help out Inspire Hifi (turntables). I take my cd player along with me to give demos of it. Last year to the dismay of Bob at Inspire it sounded better than his Eclipse 12" deck (£2.8K) running a SME 12" arm (£3K) Ortofon cartridge (£3K) and Whest phono stage (£3.5K) thats a total of £12.3K and all award winners. Both items ran into a ATC SIA2-150 amp and ATC SCM-40 speakers. On A/B comparisons running the same album Jennifer Warnes - The Hunter (his favorite) he picked my cd player 5x out of 5 as the vinyl source. Oh how I laughed.
Not many people have heard a 63 or any cdp to that matter heavily modded, and I understand it is hard to comprehend. Anyone who hears my player cannot believe it is a 63 making that sound. I know it's not really a 63 anymore but a 63 chip set sat under all the psus
But going back to whats been said a CD6003 etc is better than a 63 off the shelf (of course it costs more to buy).
Brent
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Good post Brent and good point. I think this is one problem here. People can jump to conclusions here that are simply false, such as:
* it's easy to make a CD63 amazing
* a CD63 with minor mods is a giant-killer (simply not true next to good modern products)
* an expensive product heard in a show or demo room is having a fair trial compared to your cd player working at home in an environment with good infrastructure (acoustics, background noise and mains noise)
Simon
Why red?
I was going to open my yap and say all kinds of interesting and wise things in response to the last few pages but it looks like all the bases are covered. Interesting though that this conversation should come up now, so late into the topic that Ray began. In the begin, there wasn't much expense involved or boutique parts, just smarts and basically correcting design faults or laziness;
taking things where the original designers either couldn't see or were told to keep costs down and save their know-how for models up the chain. As one who has sunk some serious money into my 67', I'm kind of apt to be defensive and take the side of "old dogs learn new tricks and sing better than new ones". It's bit late in the day to compaire apples to oranges and presumably some of us are still learning and there's probably (gasp!) more to coax out of these old gals without breaking the bank. In the end it's about doing it yourself and having the pleasure of the results. I want to say it's crazy to spend 1000£ on an old cheap Marantz, but having done so I'm hardly one to talk! There's a perverse pleasure in this I can't explain and admit it, a sort of exclusivity to the whole thing. As Simon said a few pages back, an unmodded 63 or 67 sounds pretty bad if you know what the good is. I'm listening to one right now so know whereof I speak. Oh I did speak after all! This old dog has speech! OH and I'm a sucker for boutique parts (or a snob?) and they DO work and you do have to pay for the damn things (just as you have to pay to have other people doitforyou.
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I do believe i've opened a can of worms here im sorry guys its a hobby come learning curve for me,im a musician myself so i know whats sounds good {bass player}my player in the state of tune its at is really very good a handfull of 7805s a 25quid clock and some cheap large uf caps.
my aim is to improve further now. so called "boutique parts" cost big bucks i love the wolf in sheeps clothing aproach but hey thats me some say my limit is to much but a c2 clock is £175 and 4 spowers is £160. so my limit may see some change lol.
cheers guys alan
PS forgot the airbrushed case
my aim is to improve further now. so called "boutique parts" cost big bucks i love the wolf in sheeps clothing aproach but hey thats me some say my limit is to much but a c2 clock is £175 and 4 spowers is £160. so my limit may see some change lol.
cheers guys alan
PS forgot the airbrushed case
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Not at all - just have fun with it.
Simon is spot -on though - throwing money at a 'problem' is no guarantee of any kind of improvement. Be prepared to read between the lines, try one thing at a time and actually listen to it critically before moving on (actually undoing a mod is often the best test - which did you honestly prefer??)
Look: ultimately the only person you have to please with mods is yourself - never forget this; if you find after getting carried away you no longer want to simply listen to music at home...it's all gone to custard. Bin the internet and the all-too-common peeing contests on forums, and settel for what pleases you, most often
I like mods based on solid engineering. Another may not. And that's fine! [size=-2](I do think claims to some kind of 'best' are utterly ridiculous as a result though... either way. And we'll all never establish high-quality audio as desirable to the Masses when it all looks like ******** and infighting as a result) [/size]