Here's an interesting article (this is the raw text, no photos sadly) from Hifi Critic by Stan Curtis (designer of Cambridge Audio CD1, CD2, CD3 for example) on a failed project for a high-end CD player for B&W / SME.
http://www.stancurtis.com/PDFs/HiFi Critic 6.pdf
Interestingly the article also speaks of the sonic results of removing much of the digital filtering and also analogue filters, beneficial results to Stan Curtis's ears whilst not recommending it due to the nyquist images still being there..
http://www.stancurtis.com/PDFs/HiFi Critic 6.pdf
Interestingly the article also speaks of the sonic results of removing much of the digital filtering and also analogue filters, beneficial results to Stan Curtis's ears whilst not recommending it due to the nyquist images still being there..
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...agreed with all you say ...up to a point: the Shiga MKIII transport cannot do I2S ...if it could then it would be perfect.
😎
Hi NATDBERG,
I was authorized warranty for Tascam at the time. I am intimately familiar with those transports. What they prove is that if you throw enough money at a problem, you can make it work.
We had problems with the bearings and alignment with the VRDS mechanisms. It would have performed much better than it did using the normal light mass system. The CD-701 was one of my favorites using a KSS-151A laser head assy. They did well in studios, and that is what they were designed for. The unit you described on the bass cabinet likely had its tracking gain adjusted high. They were pretty good, but normally that good (unless the vibration was lower than you thought). If I ran across a CD-701 today, I would fix it up and use it.
Teac / Tascam in those days were heavily sales department driven. Some manufacturers (like Teac / Tascam) decided to go with whatever was seen to be an edge for sales blah-blah-blah. Pioneer made a lot of noise about their "stable platter" and it got some traction with consumers. They first said that the CD player was to replace the turntable. After that, they began to market turntable-like features (stable platter = heavy turntable). The average person could relate to that and so that direction worked for sales. But, never confuse a sales "feature" with what is mechanically and technically correct. Some of you are still taken in with this ploy. CEC even went as far as to make a CD player with a belt drive! Some of you who I met at Burning Amp 1 defended the belt drive strongly, so effective was the advertising.
Always remember false assumption #1. A CD player is not a turntable. They operate differently at a fundamental level and performance requirements diverge rapidly from that point further.
About filtering. You need it to be in place. The severity of the type of filter (order) is directly coupled with the sampling frequency. The higher that frequency is, the further out that filter can be, and them more gentle the slope can be. What is the worst case situation. You're going to love it. No oversampling, and no filter. If any of you really do understand the D to A process and sampling theory, you would never do this. Yet there are some of you standing up as experts that advocate this stupidity. Folks who follow this aren't stupid, they just don't have the right information and the NOS show is more attractive than the technical side of things. It's always more attractive to "buck the system" and to think some people know more than the folks who actually work in that field professionally and have had training. I find it painful to watch people being led down the garden path by self-proclaimed experts. If you don't believe the science, then go ask a mathematician.
-Chris
I was authorized warranty for Tascam at the time. I am intimately familiar with those transports. What they prove is that if you throw enough money at a problem, you can make it work.
We had problems with the bearings and alignment with the VRDS mechanisms. It would have performed much better than it did using the normal light mass system. The CD-701 was one of my favorites using a KSS-151A laser head assy. They did well in studios, and that is what they were designed for. The unit you described on the bass cabinet likely had its tracking gain adjusted high. They were pretty good, but normally that good (unless the vibration was lower than you thought). If I ran across a CD-701 today, I would fix it up and use it.
Teac / Tascam in those days were heavily sales department driven. Some manufacturers (like Teac / Tascam) decided to go with whatever was seen to be an edge for sales blah-blah-blah. Pioneer made a lot of noise about their "stable platter" and it got some traction with consumers. They first said that the CD player was to replace the turntable. After that, they began to market turntable-like features (stable platter = heavy turntable). The average person could relate to that and so that direction worked for sales. But, never confuse a sales "feature" with what is mechanically and technically correct. Some of you are still taken in with this ploy. CEC even went as far as to make a CD player with a belt drive! Some of you who I met at Burning Amp 1 defended the belt drive strongly, so effective was the advertising.
Always remember false assumption #1. A CD player is not a turntable. They operate differently at a fundamental level and performance requirements diverge rapidly from that point further.
About filtering. You need it to be in place. The severity of the type of filter (order) is directly coupled with the sampling frequency. The higher that frequency is, the further out that filter can be, and them more gentle the slope can be. What is the worst case situation. You're going to love it. No oversampling, and no filter. If any of you really do understand the D to A process and sampling theory, you would never do this. Yet there are some of you standing up as experts that advocate this stupidity. Folks who follow this aren't stupid, they just don't have the right information and the NOS show is more attractive than the technical side of things. It's always more attractive to "buck the system" and to think some people know more than the folks who actually work in that field professionally and have had training. I find it painful to watch people being led down the garden path by self-proclaimed experts. If you don't believe the science, then go ask a mathematician.
-Chris
I read that Teac/Tascam was the last one making them.
Product: CD-6010 | TASCAM
I got to page 11 before posting, going back to read up on things.
Lots of interesting things in this thread.🙂
Is the CD-5010B nothing more than an ATAPI CD-ROM drive? No wonder it is so good. 🙂
CD-5010B » TEAC Industrial Products Division
CD-5010B » TEAC Industrial Products Division
Sarcasm?
Vela Audio - CD player
[Review] Vela Audio CD player, listening test
Is this CD-Rom unit as good or better than other drives already mentioned?
As far as I remember, the CD5010B is nothing but a Sanyo mechanism - But I am not sure.
@kac22i Drive is Sony BU-1 frpm CDP-502ES, very common in 1985. Then they cut corners
@kac22i Drive is Sony BU-1 frpm CDP-502ES, very common in 1985. Then they cut corners
The Teac players used the KSS-151A which is superficially similar but plastic. That photo is of a BU-1 I'm pretty sure. The KSS-190A is also similar but not exactly the same. I own examples of all three if any pictures would be helpful to this thread?
Here about the new VRDS - Neo Mecano VRDS-NEO Mechanism | Esoteric supporting all formats 😀
VRDS-NEO “VMK-3.5-20S” transport mechanism and the only player
Hp
VRDS-NEO “VMK-3.5-20S” transport mechanism and the only player
Hp
Attachments
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I'm no expert, but the above looks good to me.
RE: Teac/Tascam CD-5010B and the plastic case 5020...................
Welcome to SAKURA SYSTEM's new site.
home
As I understand it, the 47 Laboratory's very expensive CD (and good) players were the inspiration behind these many mod/DIY threads.
I have no idea if 47 Labs is going to follow through, and which TEAC mechanism they are looking at. I assume they were attracted (as I was) to something still in production and not something they would have to salvage.
I am very interested in what this thread comes up with, other than another 2008 boombox salvage job.
EDIT:
ESOTERIC K-01 CD/SACD PLAYER
Full Reference Status
Equipment report
by Alan Taffel | Mar 28th, 2013
Esoteric K-01 CD/SACD Player | The Absolute Sound
Something in common with the $1,000 CD player I was looking at?
TASCAM CD-6010
AK4480 D/A Converters (manufactured by Asahi Kasei Microdevices)
Product: CD-6010 | TASCAM
PingPing over at Audio Circles had the TASCAM CD-6010 last year, the sound never flushed out enough for him, not even after +350 hours of use, so he moved on.
Still interesting to me to see some of the same suppliers in pro/mid-fi and upper end equipment.
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This was an interesting find.
Esoteric TEAC UX-3 SACD DVD CD
https://app.audiogon.com/listings/c...d-cd-2015-11-18-digital-92694-ladera-ranch-ca
What a horrible thing for some people to do.
Reminds me of the story about the mid 1960's Shelby Mustang's Hertz used to rent out. People were drag racing them or worse, pulling the engines out and replacing them with stock engines.
Esoteric TEAC UX-3 SACD DVD CD
https://app.audiogon.com/listings/c...d-cd-2015-11-18-digital-92694-ladera-ranch-ca
What a horrible thing for some people to do.
Reminds me of the story about the mid 1960's Shelby Mustang's Hertz used to rent out. People were drag racing them or worse, pulling the engines out and replacing them with stock engines.
Hi Mike P,
The KSS-151A seems to be dimensionally stable, so going with the other materials might offer minimal benefits, yet cost more.
Hi HpW,
That one is a no-go from my stand point. Adding mass to a rotating system is only a good idea for turntables. CD players operate entirely differently. You want to decrease the rotating mass as much as you can. The much faster rotation of a CD allows the CD to stabilize itself. Compare 33 1/3 or 45 constant RPM to a CD where the center rotates closer to 500 rpm, falling to 300 rpm or so near the outside tracks. The big takeaway there is the a record is a constant angular velocity, the CD is a constant linear velocity (rotational/angular speed changes). Since rotating mass tends to fight changes in angular velocity adding to it in a CD player makes the disc motor less able to correct for variations in rotational speed. The rotational velocity in a CD must be able to change quickly in order to spin up to read the TOC, or to change tracks. Turntables historically do not do this (the Nakamichi Dragon TT might) to compensate for off-center media.
Mounting laser heads upside down seems problematic for me also. The suspensions are designed to cope with gravity pulling the lens down, not up with respect to the head assy.
-Chris
The KSS-151A seems to be dimensionally stable, so going with the other materials might offer minimal benefits, yet cost more.
Hi HpW,
That one is a no-go from my stand point. Adding mass to a rotating system is only a good idea for turntables. CD players operate entirely differently. You want to decrease the rotating mass as much as you can. The much faster rotation of a CD allows the CD to stabilize itself. Compare 33 1/3 or 45 constant RPM to a CD where the center rotates closer to 500 rpm, falling to 300 rpm or so near the outside tracks. The big takeaway there is the a record is a constant angular velocity, the CD is a constant linear velocity (rotational/angular speed changes). Since rotating mass tends to fight changes in angular velocity adding to it in a CD player makes the disc motor less able to correct for variations in rotational speed. The rotational velocity in a CD must be able to change quickly in order to spin up to read the TOC, or to change tracks. Turntables historically do not do this (the Nakamichi Dragon TT might) to compensate for off-center media.
Mounting laser heads upside down seems problematic for me also. The suspensions are designed to cope with gravity pulling the lens down, not up with respect to the head assy.
-Chris
If that's how you use CD's then great, but what about us lazy old farts who don't even use the remote and just put a CD in and hit play?
At most I might press the skip button to advance to let's say the 4th track, but play out the rest of the CD in order (just as I would with a record player/turntable).
In the situation I described above a high mass system would work great (because you just keep on rolling along), plus the benefits which come with the extra mass.
It's a matter of making choices.
There is an Esoteric combo on A-gon right now which lists for almost $100,000, somebody thought it was a good idea - just say'n.
EDIT: Yet another way to cook your eggs.
NuForce CDP-8 CD player
By Wes Phillips • Posted: Nov 21, 2010
Read more at NuForce CDP-8 CD player | Stereophile.com
NuForce CDP-8 CD player | Stereophile.com
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Hi kach22i,
Depending on how much mass is on the system, skipping up a track or 2 could cause the CD to lose lock on the CD. Lazy old fart or not has nothing to do with the actual process of playing a CD.
I operate mine much the same way as you do. But why design a system that fights itself and reduces performance for zero gain? You seem to be under the impression that normal CD players suffer from a speed stability problem - but they don't. There isn't one bit of performance gain afforded by any "stable platter" system. This is the core problem, you have been lied to through advertising. You are still thinking along the lines of a turntable. The Thorens I use has a 2.5 kg platter, works fantastically well. But this table doesn't play CDs very well! 🙂
It is both less expensive and better performance using the standard, magnetic clamp system with low mass. The stable platter actually adds to data errors, never reducing them. Once you can accept that CD players and record players are fundamentally different in the way they work, you'll understand better.
-Chris
Depending on how much mass is on the system, skipping up a track or 2 could cause the CD to lose lock on the CD. Lazy old fart or not has nothing to do with the actual process of playing a CD.
I operate mine much the same way as you do. But why design a system that fights itself and reduces performance for zero gain? You seem to be under the impression that normal CD players suffer from a speed stability problem - but they don't. There isn't one bit of performance gain afforded by any "stable platter" system. This is the core problem, you have been lied to through advertising. You are still thinking along the lines of a turntable. The Thorens I use has a 2.5 kg platter, works fantastically well. But this table doesn't play CDs very well! 🙂
It is both less expensive and better performance using the standard, magnetic clamp system with low mass. The stable platter actually adds to data errors, never reducing them. Once you can accept that CD players and record players are fundamentally different in the way they work, you'll understand better.
-Chris
The rotation/read speed is about keeping the FIFO buffer approximately half full. Low mass means faster/low power servo control.
The best way to improve CD playback is handle them correctly. No bending or scratching please.
The best way to improve CD playback is handle them correctly. No bending or scratching please.
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