Beresford Caiman Review

[audiodelic]

sorry about going OT, but how is the audioengine sub?

Its good mates very well with the speakers do the extent that when i listen to solely the monitors now i cant, simply cannot it feels like something is lacking.
But i think the audio engine speakers give you more value for money than their subwoofer.

Actually the plan is first to buy a caiman in the near future then finally shift the a5's to hyderabad and upgrade to the Dynaudio BM6A once i collect the moolah maybe by early 2011 and mate those with the as8 subwoofer. :licklips:

 

[nmurthyk]

Hi Ashish,

What type of cable(cable means including connectors) should be used between DVDP & DAC. I knew that it should be a coaxial cable but got confused as somebody was talking about digital & analog coaxial cables in some other thread. Please suggest me something more appropriate as i never used any of these.

Regards,
NmurthyK

 

[ashishkesarwani]

Hi Ashish,

What type of cable(cable means including connectors) should be used between DVDP & DAC. I knew that it should be a coaxial cable but got confused as somebody was talking about digital & analog coaxial cables in some other thread. Please suggest me something more appropriate as i never used any of these.

Regards,
NmurthyK

In my case I have used a Digital Coaxial Cable to connect Oppo Bdp83 with the DAC. Digital Coaxial cable is like a single RCA cable with the wire capable of 75 ohms.

 

[audiodelic]

Hi Ashish,

What type of cable(cable means including connectors) should be used between DVDP & DAC. I knew that it should be a coaxial cable but got confused as somebody was talking about digital & analog coaxial cables in some other thread. Please suggest me something more appropriate as i never used any of these.

Regards,
NmurthyK

Preference coaxial digital 75 ohm cable otherwise optical digital cable.

 

[ashishkesarwani]

Guys after spending some time with my setup today I have done a remarkable thing:
I had a huge collection of CD's with me but they were all badly scratched because of which a regular Cd player is unable to read them but with computer cd rom I have dumped them to an External HDD through itunes in apple lossless format with all the Album details and titles. Now the biggest problem with this kind of conversion was that since this format of apple lossless or M4A is proprietory to Apple so I could either play them through an Ipod or through a computer but in my case my 60Gb Ipod is already full with some 9000+ songs so all I am left was to play these files either through a computer or through my PS3 booted in Linux with VLC media player.
In the case of coumputer I had to change tracks through computer everytime but in the case of Ps3 I has the option of either running Ps3 media server and control through the PS3 bluetooth remote.
Today I came accross Apple remote software for Iphone or Ipod touch which lets me have full control over my computer's Itunes and I could use it to play any track without even going near a computer or turning my LCD or Projector on. Guys this is a boon in disguise for guys looking for this kind of a setup in which they want to enjoy their digital music without bothering to go near a computer and even turning a Display device.
Plus the DAC is doing all the conversion here so the quality of sound is simply amazing in my case. Its like every pennys worth.

 

[ashishkesarwani]

After all the tests I have carried out today I have come to the conclusion that the music source i.e the file should be a lossless one to truly enjoy the capability of these External DAC's, it some how lends some kind of listenability factor to MP3s but that too at low volumes. Come to think of a lossless file which is more than 30mb whereas the same file when converted to Mp3 comes to the size of mere 5-8 mb so a chunk of data which is lost during the conversion process will never be regained even by introducing a DAC. I also completely agree with Vinod's fact that these DACs need atleast 100-150 hours for burn in process and in my case the run in time has been just around 20-25 hours and I expect further improvement after the said run in period is complete.

 

[Kamal]

Ashish, how was the sound quality using just the BDP 83, compared to feeding the digital out of the BDP thru the DAC?

 

[gobble]

Ashish, how was the sound quality using just the BDP 83, compared to feeding the digital out of the BDP thru the DAC?

Good question hyeah:. a lot of our forum members future purchases depend on a reliable answer to this one

cheers

 

[anm]

that kind of a remote app is needed in xtreamer. Thisis what I was cribbing about in forums. A remote app that they have created for xtreamer is BS. U need something like this app. Hope it will come soon to xtreamer

Guys after spending some time with my setup today I have done a remarkable thing:
I had a huge collection of CD's with me but they were all badly scratched because of which a regular Cd player is unable to read them but with computer cd rom I have dumped them to an External HDD through itunes in apple lossless format with all the Album details and titles. Now the biggest problem with this kind of conversion was that since this format of apple lossless or M4A is proprietory to Apple so I could either play them through an Ipod or through a computer but in my case my 60Gb Ipod is already full with some 9000+ songs so all I am left was to play these files either through a computer or through my PS3 booted in Linux with VLC media player.
In the case of coumputer I had to change tracks through computer everytime but in the case of Ps3 I has the option of either running Ps3 media server and control through the PS3 bluetooth remote.
Today I came accross Apple remote software for Iphone or Ipod touch which lets me have full control over my computer's Itunes and I could use it to play any track without even going near a computer or turning my LCD or Projector on. Guys this is a boon in disguise for guys looking for this kind of a setup in which they want to enjoy their digital music without bothering to go near a computer and even turning a Display device.
Plus the DAC is doing all the conversion here so the quality of sound is simply amazing in my case. Its like every pennys worth.

 

[madbullram]

After all the tests I have carried out today I have come to the conclusion that the music source i.e the file should be a lossless one to truly enjoy the capability of these External DAC's, it some how lends some kind of listenability factor to MP3s but that too at low volumes. Come to think of a lossless file which is more than 30mb whereas the same file when converted to Mp3 comes to the size of mere 5-8 mb so a chunk of data which is lost during the conversion process will never be regained even by introducing a DAC. I also completely agree with Vinod's fact that these DACs need atleast 100-150 hours for burn in process and in my case the run in time has been just around 20-25 hours and I expect further improvement after the said run in period is complete.

Can you covert the mp3 at 320 kbps and then compare pls?

 

[ashishkesarwani]

Ashish, how was the sound quality using just the BDP 83, compared to feeding the digital out of the BDP thru the DAC?

To perform this test I connected the coaxial cable from the Oppo to the DAC as well as the HDMI to the AVR. Now in this test when I first played the cd through the Oppo in which I chose to get the DA conversion done through AVR, I could enjoy the SQ but when I switched it with the External DAC then I noticed a difference in the sound signature of that particular track which had changed completely. There was a vast improvement in Vocals as well as the overall detailing, also this time the Bass had more weight in it which was rather missing when Oppo was using the DAC of the AVR. Then I again switch forth between the DAC of the AVR and the Beresford and I could feel that with the AVR, music had certian kind of hollowness i.e something was missing, whereas with the Beresford it was sounding warm with ample detailing and depth. This test shows that the external DAC of this quality is a clear winner if music is conserned and if a person wants to use an AVR as an amplifier.
To perform these tests I kept AVR in pure audio mode when playing music directly through its own DAC as well as the External one, also the Oppo was also used in the pure direct mode with all its display circutery turned off. This test was a very good one to directly compare the two DACs of AVR /Beresford.

 

[ashishkesarwani]

Can you covert the mp3 at 320 kbps and then compare pls?

Ram I did try it with the MP3 file of the same rate but the result was rather disappointing. Yes you can listen to it at mediacre volume levels but once you listen to same track which is in lossless format then you wouldn't wana switch back to Mp3.

 

[santhosh]

FYI, for those who have not read already. An interesting experiment with graphical representation about loss in MP3 at various rates:
http://www.hifivision.com/mp3-mp4-wma-players-accessories/7231-experiment-mp3-really-lossy.html

 

[anm]

I think what Kamal wants is the comparison between Oppo's own DAC vs external DAC. For this comparison, you need to connect analog out of oppo to your avr.

regards

To perform this test I connected the coaxial cable from the Oppo to the DAC as well as the HDMI to the AVR. Now in this test when I first played the cd through the Oppo in which I chose to get the DA conversion done through AVR, I could enjoy the SQ but when I switched it with the External DAC then I noticed a difference in the sound signature of that particular track which had changed completely. There was a vast improvement in Vocals as well as the overall detailing, also this time the Bass had more weight in it which was rather missing when Oppo was using the DAC of the AVR. Then I again switch forth between the DAC of the AVR and the Beresford and I could feel that with the AVR, music had certian kind of hollowness i.e something was missing, whereas with the Beresford it was sounding warm with ample detailing and depth. This test shows that the external DAC of this quality is a clear winner if music is conserned and if a person wants to use an AVR as an amplifier.
To perform these tests I kept AVR in pure audio mode when playing music directly through its own DAC as well as the External one, also the Oppo was also used in the pure direct mode with all its display circutery turned off. This test was a very good one to directly compare the two DACs of AVR /Beresford.

 

[audiodelic]

I think what Kamal wants is the comparison between Oppo's own DAC vs external DAC. For this comparison, you need to connect analog out of oppo to your avr.
regards

you have your next experiment ashish ...

 

[ashishkesarwani]

I think what Kamal wants is the comparison between Oppo's own DAC vs external DAC. For this comparison, you need to connect analog out of oppo to your avr.

regards

Kamal specifically asked for the digital connection between the Oppo BDP i.e HDMI in this case to the AVR VS the DAC or I could have misinterpretted.

 

[ashishkesarwani]

you have your next experiment ashish ...

If its so then I am sure that it will take place during the weekends.

 

[spirovious]

Well ,when we say detailed sound,the device shld sound musical & cohesive.
Otherwise we cannot enjoy music,but only search detailing.
Where is caiman standing.

 

[gobble]

Eagerly awaiting pure audio output SQ rating from Oppo vs DAC vs budget CDP

Cheers

 

[ashishkesarwani]

Well ,when we say detailed sound,the device shld sound musical & cohesive.
Otherwise we cannot enjoy music,but only search detailing.
Where is caiman standing.

When I meant detailing I meant that I could hear and recognize each instrument played in a particular track, also the separation was a good one whereas when connected directly then this detailing is very hard to hear. Also overall bass response has improved tremendously. All this adds up to a very pleasant musical experience which you can hear at a stretch of 4-5 hours at descent volume levels.
Caiman is neither bright nor too bassy in direct comparison with TC7510 which I throughly enjoyed before, and since its always easier to compare and corelate the differences specially in the case when you downgrade rather than Upgrade.