Topic: Maybe a decent Universal Player option?

[noam]

Hopefully it's only doing that on commercial copyrighted DVD-A's. 

I'm pretty sure he was NOT referring to commercial copyrighted DVD-A's, but to a test signal he burnt himself. He uses the same program I do for his privately recorded and burned DVD-A's (DiscWelder Bronze.)

Noam

[nickgregory]

I would be interested if you can post what other players he tested..when I had a 722, I hooked the digital output to my Pioneer Elite DV-45A and the 722 locked onto a 24/96 signal...curious what players show up that dont...

[noam]

I would be interested if you can post what other players he tested..when I had a 722, I hooked the digital output to my Pioneer Elite DV-45A and the 722 locked onto a 24/96 signal...curious what players show up that dont...

Technics DVD-A10, Ayre C-5xe,  McCormack MDP-1, Pioneer DV-AX10, Linn  Unidisk and Unidisk SC, Classe CDP-202,  Bel Canto PL-1A - all these output 96/24 according to JA. He didn't mention any player that did not.

Noam

[nickgregory]

I would be interested if you can post what other players he tested..when I had a 722, I hooked the digital output to my Pioneer Elite DV-45A and the 722 locked onto a 24/96 signal...curious what players show up that dont...

Technics DVD-A10, Ayre C-5xe,  McCormack MDP-1, Pioneer DV-AX10, Linn  Unidisk and Unidisk SC, Classe CDP-202,  Bel Canto PL-1A - all these output 96/24 according to JA. He didn't mention any player that did not.

Noam

so given that I am not going to throw my pioneer or denon 2900 under the bus

[noam]

24/96 via coax for DVD-V and/or DVD-A?

I did not see anyone mention this on this thread, but John Atkinson DID
measure the DV-970HD's S/PDIF jacks and found out that they DO output 96kHz and
192 kHz, BUT, that they dithered 24-bit audio to 16-bit.
Noam

I seems I got it wrong (and nobody here called me on that): What JA measured was that the Oppo doesn't even redither 24-bit data to 16, but merely truncates.

Noam

[Nick's Picks]

...but what if its internal DAC sounds damn good on its own?  its still well worth the dough for that performance only.

[Chris K]

amazon delivered an oppo 970hd to me yesterday. i bought it based on the recommendations here and the reviews on amazon, videohelp, and a few other places.

i will be using it it primarily for video into a 32" panasonic LCD via HDMI. played a few dvd's last nite and the upsampling is great. there is a hack that can make the oppo region free which is nice, but i havent i havent tried it yet. only thing i dont like so far is that the tray doesnt sem to open up all the way, but i can deal with that.

thanks to all for posting your thoughts and research on this unit to help me make my decision! 

[jmz93]

I've been using a Pioneer dv45A or is it 47A? universal player for a couple years now, for 2-channel playbac of CD's, DVD-A's, and SACD's.
I'm thinking of upgrading, but have no idea what the better universal players are for say, under a grand new.  What are you guys using?

I'm not using an external DAC ... it's just player, into 5w class A SET tube amp, into two speakers. Nothing more.
Looking for best bang for the buck.

I've heard great things about the Marantz 8001, andlove thatit's specifically for 2-channel audio, but it doesn't do dvd-a.

[RebelRebel]

...but what if its internal DAC sounds damn good on its own?  its still well worth the dough for that performance only.

and it does sound nice. Tests are nice and all, but how does it sound?? If it sounds good(to me) , then scientific data doesnt really mean much. I was reading  an interview with one of those old Engineers who used to work with Presley and Ernest Tubb, Roy Orbison, and others. The interviewer (one of those Audiophile magazine guys) said something about how it mustve been hard working with those old machines that had horrible Specs and measured terribly.. The guy said "we didnt look at graphs or data." " we just listened back then". Hilarious.

"IS THERE ANY DVD PLAYER OUT THERE (for <$1000) THAT WAS MEASURED TO REALLY OUTPUT 96/24 THROUGH ITS S/PDIF jacks? "

are you talking about your recordings or commercial stuff/? From what I understand, with your own recordings, 96/24 isnt an issue with SPDIF, but with commercial discs, it is.

Since the coaxial or optical digital audio output has no copy-protection ability (i.e. pure audio stream without encryption and authentication), audio from DVD-Audio or SACD cannot be output via these interfaces. To enjoy high resolution digital audio from DVD-Audio or SACD discs, please use the 5.1-channel analogue audio output.

[taosmay]

I'm not sure if this is the appropriate page for this introductory query, but I am trying to figure all this out, and need some insight. I want to switch from 16/44.1 recording(on my Sony d100 dat) to 24/48 recording(on my new Edirol R-09).

I want to be able to transfer the 24/48k audio from the r-09 to my computer - a mac mini/1.5GHz procesor,G4 - which I'm sure is easy via the usb cable, but then my computer dvd drive must first be able to burn dvd-a, or dvd-v disc's, in order for them to be recorded on that media at 24/48K, right? I'm pretty sure that my dvd drive on my mac mini does not have that capability. So I'm guessing that I first need to get a dvd drive capable of burning dvd-a, and/or dvd-v - is their a preference/big difference between these, if we are only talking about audio playback?

Then, once I have succesfully computer burned a 24/48k home audio recording onto a dvd-a/dvd-v disc - and want to play it back through my home stereo, and not the computer - I'll need a standalone dvd player to connect to my home stereo, which plays back 24/48k audio recordings, on dvd-a/dvd-v discs. At this point I think it gets a little fuzzy as to what player to get, by reading the previous posts, if I am using an exterrnal DAC or not...Currently I use a Aragon D2A2 DAC, but I think that only upsamples to 20bit - it's about 11 years old. I'm guessing it would be better to just bypass that unit, and get a new dvd player that does 24/48 on it's own. If I don't use the coax digi output of the dvd player, and just use the analog outputs to my preamp, I just need a dvd player that plays back audio on dvd-a or dvd-v disc's, in order to play back live shows I recorded at 24/48k?

Sorry, but is this a rambling, what the hell is he talking about post, and why didn't he do more searching, first?

Harold 

[Nick's Picks]

as long as you have a DVD burner, you're all set.

google up "dvd-audiofile".  you can take your masters, track them with CDWAV (which handles 24bit) and output them directly as FLAC files, which the audiofile software wants.

that software will take all of those FLAC files and create a DVD-A .iso image that you can then burn with any software capable of burning an .iso.  which should be just about anything.

as for playback...
any current DVD-A capable deck will work for you.  There are lots of them, ranging from cheap to not so cheap.
this Oppo we are talking about, which is a universal player (DVD-A, CD, HDCD, SACD..etc), will do exactly what you want...for $150.
and it will sound good.  In fact, i bet it will outperform your 11 year old DAC.  Its silly to think of how good it sounds for the money.

Another option...
get a new DAC that can do 24/96 (most any new one will) and a means to pass a digital signal from your computer. 
MAC digi out > DAC > stereo > smiles!

[anodyne33]

Any word on the 970 being discontinued? I checked out Oppo's site yesterday and it says that the 970 is out of stock, but there's one left on Amazon, and there's a new model at the $170 price point. I'm wondering if this is the replacement?

[Sanjay]

check ebay, I know the company was unloading a whole bunch there recently for less than normal price.  I picked up one.

[noam]

This is how they responded to my e-mail:
 
Noam,

We have heard conflicting reports about the audio support through optical and coaxial. Our manufacturer partners and reviewers have said that we dither to 16-bit, while end users and beta testers claim to receive 24-bit through optical and coaxial. Our official statement is 16-bit.

Best Regards,

Customer Service
OPPO Digital, Inc.
453 Ravendale Dr, Suite D Mountain View, CA 94043
Service@oppodigital.com
Tel: 650-961-1118
Fax: 650-961-1119



-----Original Message-----
From: Noam  [mailto:noam@___.com]
Sent: Fri 9/21/2007 12:45 PM
To: OPPO Service
Subject: 96/24 audio output through digital coaxial/optical

Hi,

I have a collection of 96Hz/24bit private recordings,
burned into DVD-A's, and I use an external D/A
convertor (Benchmark DAC1.) Do you make a DVD player
that outputs 96Hz/24bit through the digital
coaxial/optical outputs without truncating or
redithering the signal? John Atkinson from Stereophile
magazine measured the DV-970HD's S/PDIF jacks and
found out that even though they output 96kHz and 192
kHz, they dithered 24-bit audio to 16-bit. Do you make
a model that does not do that?

thanks, Noam

check ebay, I know the company was unloading a whole bunch there recently for less than normal price.  I picked up one.

[Colin Liston]

This is how they responded to my e-mail:
 
Noam,

We have heard conflicting reports about the audio support through optical and coaxial. Our manufacturer partners and reviewers have said that we dither to 16-bit, while end users and beta testers claim to receive 24-bit through optical and coaxial. Our official statement is 16-bit.

How could they not know?