CD Player vs Dedicated MS vs Mac as TOP Quality MS
hikejohn -- Sun, 09/28/2008 - 10:40
Presently I use an Ayre D1xe CD/DVD player in my system. It seems time to consider changing it out....to perhaps:
new CD player, or
MS like Linn...but interface suffers, or
Sooloos/Qusonix server with a separate DAC
Mac computer/as server with separate DAC with iTunes
any thoughts as to quality of reproduction...
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The Sooloos has the best user interface BY FAR.
The Mac solution is the least expensive, but if you get serious iTunes will wear out its welcome.
If you only want to buy a server once, I'd go with the Sooloos.
Steven Stone
Contributor to The Absolute Sound, EnjoytheMusic.com, Vintage Guitar Magazine, and other fine publications
Hi,
Thanks for your thoughts....does the Soolos system required a separate/high performance DAC to begin to approach the state of the art??
John
The internal DAC in the Sooloos is quite poor. You absolutely need an outboard DAC with the Sooloos. That said, it does have the best user interface.
Could you please elaborate as to why iTunes will wear out its welcome? And what do you advocate using instead?
Thanks-in-advance.
Larry
"Digital finishes what the transistor began" James Boyk
iTunes is fine for organizing music on a computer and transferring to an iPod, but it's far from ideal for the main interface between you and your music library in the listening room. Take a tour of the Sooloos or Qsonix user interfaces and you'll see how much better they are than iTunes.
Thanks Robert; I incorrectly assumed you were comparing iTunes to something like Foobar, rather than to the top-of-the-line systems like Soolos.
Larry
"Digital finishes what the transistor began" James Boyk
I have 7500 songs (about 700 CDs) in original CD quality (AIFF and WAV) ripped on my Mac Mini with 500GB USB hard disk, and I am using iTunes. iTunes as music server interface works just fine for me. Not most ideal but very good enough indeed (I would be brave to claim even excellent) for the money.
My setup is - I am connecting Mac Mini to my Quad CDP-2 via optical input (using Toslink cable) and then Quad analog output (RCA cable) goes to Krell KRC-3 pre-amp's S1 input. Krell KRC-3 drives 2xQuad 909s used for bi-amping Neat Motive 1 speakers. I have to declare that the sound from Mac as a digital source is amazing through this system.
The only problem is that iTunes can't always find the cover art for some albums (30%) in its own database! If that's big deal for you go with another solution.
For me cashing out around 10000$ for Soolos set-up (keep in mind that it is just a source :-) is insane in my opinion just for somewhat better user interface. Even Robert says that Soolos does not have acceptable quality DAC and that you need external DAC. I can't explain why the product which costs so much doesn't have good quality DAC as part of the system. Beats me.
To summarize - for the money iTunes is just fine.
"The only problem is that iTunes can't always find the cover art for some albums (30%) in its own database! If that's big deal for you go with another solution."
I've tried several of the third-party album-art finding programs with some success, but most of them rely on Amazon for their art and if you have eclectic tastes chances are that even third-party programs won't find much of your album art.
I'm often forced to do Google searches to find art to imbed in my iTunes. Sometimes I even add my own photos when the tracks are from live unreleased recorded performances.
One of the nice things about iTunes is that you can add anything you want for "cover art." The only limitations are your imagination and the amount of time you want to invest in the project.
Steven Stone
Contributor to The Absolute Sound, EnjoytheMusic.com, Vintage Guitar Magazine, and other fine publications