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Silver discs can make golden sound

By Roy Johnson, loudspeaker designer, Green Mountain Audio, Inc.

For music reproduction, you will find that great CD and DVD players make CDs sound more musical, clear, dynamic -- and yet more relaxed. Their sound is less 'electronic' and 'mechanical.' Movie soundtracks, especially those on early DVDs, are much less harsh. All soundtracks are more engaging and enveloping. Live concerts are exciting! Our guidance will help you to better understand today's new source materials and listen for sonic differences.

The state of the art

Today's audio upgrades have come from improvements in playback (decoding) and recording (encoding) of the digits -- the individual bits of information that make a digital recording.

Attempts at providing better encoding and decoding have resulted in Super Audio CDs (SACDs) from Sony and Philips.

Through better encoding, mastering, and production, we now have the very special XRCDs from JVC. DVDs and Blu-Ray discs are beginning to be manufactured with higher-resolution audio tracks.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, though, are the ubiquitous MP3 files for download. Not exactly musical.

SACD discs require a special player, but those discs often include a 'regular CD layer' for a standard CD machine to read. Because of new SACD encoding methods at the master stage (called DSD encoding), that 'regular' CD layer will still sound better than the usual CD version. The XRCD discs require no special player.

Sounds are encoded on standard DVD movie and concert soundtracks as 'Dolby Digital' or 'DTS' signals. Both of those encoding systems literally 'throw away' the more delicate signals to make room for 5.1 channels of sound. That information is discarded in very much the same manner as it is for creating MP3s -- to make small file sizes and also to fit as many as possible onto an iPod.

Blu-Ray discs have sharper pictures. They can have better sound -- which is something the studios decide to add based on either cost, time, or marketing considerations. If the studios decide to produce better sound, the result is called either DTS-HD or Dolby TrueHD for the soundtracks. Once mastered, each disc cost little more to produce than a regular disc, which is also true of all other high-resolution discs, both audio and video.

Auditioning

The sonic differences between players of any sort will be clearly audible through our speakers, such as the clarity, bass impact, and smoothness of the highs. However, what should impress you in the long run is an improvement in the musicality -- such as hearing and feeling how much fun the band is having during a performance. This is true even when deciding between DVD players for movie playback. If you do not hear much difference right away, there probably is not much to hear or other problems in the system may be masking any improvements.

Expect to invest some time auditioning any player, however, before you can say 'yes' or 'no.' Although you may trust your ears and otherwise be able to quickly decide whether any player is right for your system, the player itself will need three days to fully warm up and up to three weeks to become fully broken-in, assuming constant play on a variety of music or soundtracks.

Connection

The quality of the interconnect cables -- analog or digital -- that send a player's audio to the system are also important in discovering the differences in sound. Trust your own ears and play a wide variety of music, even if movies comprise the bulk of your library. Without concentrating on a particular aspect of the sound, listen while relaxed to determine if your discs are more emotionally involving while using a particular cable.

Specifications

The audio specifications of CD players tend to be quite similar, so those are of little help. The same is true for the sound and picture specifications for DVD and Blu-Ray players. When it comes to determining the picture quality between DVD players, few retail showrooms are setup for accurate comparisons of the image. For this information, however, the specialist video magazines perform well in comparing color rendition, contrast, resolution, and motion artifacts.

Video calibration for DVD images

Sometimes, we may think we need a new DVD player when all we really need to do is calibrate the player's settings. Very useful setup discs for video systems are made by Video Essentials. Use one of their discs to adjust the settings, first. You will see a much better picture with images that are also easier on your eyes. The soundtrack reproduction should also improve.

Recommendations

We have been impressed with CD players from Audio Aero, Audiomat, Ayre, Canary, CEC, Edge, Marantz, Onkyo, Sony ES, and TEAC Esoteric. We have no first-hand experience with the constantly-changing lineups of DVD players and cannot make a recommendation at this time.