musical fidelity m1 cdt
- Thread starter sidvee
- Start date
Shivam
Well-Known Member
I heard the M1 CDT once and instantly liked it. It is a perfect companion for M1 Clic or DAC. I heard it with a M1 Clic acting as a DAC and I had enjoyed it a lot. My impression of the combo was of good midrange performance with smooth highs and lows. The bass response lacked the kick but was very natural sounding. Vocals were the best with this combo.
It is a nice transport but a little expensive in my opinion. A lot of good CD players can be had for this price bracket. Still if I can find a good piece in silver finish and good price, I'll surely go for it.
It is a nice transport but a little expensive in my opinion. A lot of good CD players can be had for this price bracket. Still if I can find a good piece in silver finish and good price, I'll surely go for it.
Shivam
Well-Known Member
If you still have your Ayon CD2s then you don't need any and if you have bought the DAC you were planning too already then MF Cdt will make a good companion.
Ayon cd2s is sold. My main listening will be FLAC/WAV files via a dedicated music laptop running JRiver Media center via usb into M2tech hiface evo converter, along with the clock and Power supply option feeding via coax into the Ayon Skylla II Dac. However, I need a transport for sporadic cd listening maybe 3-4 hours in a month, consequently I want to find a transport under $1500. So far my options are:
1. Musical Fidelity M1cdt
2. Oppo 105
3. Oppo 103
4. Woo Audio WTp-1
5. Pacific Valve Aune Cyclone
6. Softone Model 3
7. bel canto cd3t
Have to decide on one of these. The oppo's are an easy choice, simply because I have a 83, and recently I hooked it up and was pleasantly surprised by the sound. Secondly they are the most reviewed. So for now I will consider 103 & 105 as the top of my list and see where I end up.
Cheers,
Sid
1. Musical Fidelity M1cdt
2. Oppo 105
3. Oppo 103
4. Woo Audio WTp-1
5. Pacific Valve Aune Cyclone
6. Softone Model 3
7. bel canto cd3t
Have to decide on one of these. The oppo's are an easy choice, simply because I have a 83, and recently I hooked it up and was pleasantly surprised by the sound. Secondly they are the most reviewed. So for now I will consider 103 & 105 as the top of my list and see where I end up.
Cheers,
Sid
Hi Sidvee,
I have bought M2Tech Hiface Two USB to SPDIF Converter and got it today. My plan is to play the FLAC files using Foobar in my Sony Laptop and feed to the Ayon Cd1s's inbuilt DAC via M2Tech Hiface Two using Digital In. Will it produce satisfactory result? Which cable will be good to connect the M2Tech converter and Ayon CD1s?
rikhav
Well-Known Member
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Hi Sid
With the Opp 105 being your transport you have an option of playing your hi res files from the Oppo itself, no need for PC
Just an added option which i thought I should highlight
Another option is Modwright upgrade to the Oppo so you have solid cd player as well but since you hardly listen to cds I dont think spending that much amount is worth
With the Opp 105 being your transport you have an option of playing your hi res files from the Oppo itself, no need for PC
Just an added option which i thought I should highlight
Another option is Modwright upgrade to the Oppo so you have solid cd player as well but since you hardly listen to cds I dont think spending that much amount is worth
Hi Amitnoida,
It will be good on its own (I have the hiface unit), but it may not match your Cd1s transport. For that to happen you will have upgrade to the evo (and that was still not enough for mine to sound better than my cd2s), and finally to beat the ayon transport you will have get the clock and psu option. There has been a lot of discussion recently on other forums on how to have computer transports beat the mechanical ones, and users have found that the Berkely Audio Design Alpha USB to DAC converter ($1800) beat a $33,000 DCS transport. The same user reported that the m2tech hiface evo triple stack equalled the DCS transport. So Yes, using a outboard usb to coax conveter appears to have tremendous advantages but one has to be ready to spend upwards of $1000. Regarding coax cable, I would advise you to get a decent cable in the $150 to $200 range. I have found that cheap cables (intitially I used a generic monster) degraded the sound. Now I use a tara labs coax which works great.
Cheers,
Sid
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Thanks Sidvee. Actually, my CD1s transport is giving me trouble of occassional not reading. M2Tech Hiface would be the way out for me. It would not match the quality though. But what is Clock and PSU option?
Tara Lab Coax - what's the cost and source in India?
Sorry to be slightly off-topic with respect to your thread.
Regards
Amit
I agree Rikhav that the Modwright upgrade is a nice option but $2000 upgrade plus $1200 original player equals $3200. I just got away from the $6500 ayon cd2s and feel that with my computer setup, m2tech triple stack and Ayon Skylla II I will get better SQ than any transport say in the under $10k range. In fact Kalman Rubinson (A stereophile reviewer whose column "In the round" routinely reviews multichannel music setups) is of the opinion that if one is using an Oppo strictly as a digital transport then even the 103 will have similar performance to the 105. Appears all the improvements to the 105 are in the Analog stages.
Cheers,
Sid
If you are interested in the actual shoot outs here it is:
15 USB/SPDIF converters shootout
http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f...sports-vs-usb-spdif-converter-shootout-15193/
MODS: Not sure what links I can post. If inappropriate please delete.
Cheers,
Sid
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Hi Sidvee. For what it's worth, I came across the following on the earlier machine. Not sure if this has been addressed in the newer model (but I doubt it, only because it is rare that anyone would use a machine that has primarily been designed as a high class video player as a dedicated music only transport):
" Oppo acknowledges that in the BDP-95 they have not addressed transport issues such as clocking or jitter, so we were not surprised to find little difference between the 95 and the 83 when a CD/PCM data stream fed the same outboard converter. However, it is important to keep i mind that once the sigal enters the digital-to-analogue conversion process, the Sabre32s own anti-jitter tricks come into play. Bottom line here is that as a transport there any number of vehicles out there that are better, but that to achieve the level of performance of the BDP-95 as a complete player you'd have to spend 4 or 5 times the money." - Reviewer from Enjoythemusic.com
I was in the same position when I switched over to digital listening also, but I opted to buy a reasonable CD player instead. My thinking was that in case there was an issue with the files, or with the DAC, I always had an alternative. Needless to say, I have never had an issue to date and the CD player remains unused! Regards....
" Oppo acknowledges that in the BDP-95 they have not addressed transport issues such as clocking or jitter, so we were not surprised to find little difference between the 95 and the 83 when a CD/PCM data stream fed the same outboard converter. However, it is important to keep i mind that once the sigal enters the digital-to-analogue conversion process, the Sabre32s own anti-jitter tricks come into play. Bottom line here is that as a transport there any number of vehicles out there that are better, but that to achieve the level of performance of the BDP-95 as a complete player you'd have to spend 4 or 5 times the money." - Reviewer from Enjoythemusic.com
I was in the same position when I switched over to digital listening also, but I opted to buy a reasonable CD player instead. My thinking was that in case there was an issue with the files, or with the DAC, I always had an alternative. Needless to say, I have never had an issue to date and the CD player remains unused! Regards....
Read the post with much interest, thank you. It is well intentioned, but I would take it with a pinch of salt. There are some basic issues, as alluded to by the comments that follow which may be the reason perhaps that he is not getting the best out of some DACs. However, he has taken a lot of trouble and come to his conclusion.
Personally, I have yet to hear a well implemented USB system on a budget, so I would be really glad to have the opportunity when you are set up, although I do appreciate the thread and the review was about USB to S/PDIF converters. However, I do wish there was a better alternative to the popularly available S/PDIF connection, but at the moment it does not seem to be the case so it is used in most of the systems. It certainly has inherent limitations as well, but that is the power of having commercial strength...(it is interesting that he uses the $6,000 Stealth Varidig Digital Cable!)
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I agree as with most reviews, professional or otherwise. However, regardless of what he has done, it is staggering, to say the least that a $5k computer setup is even approaching the playback level of a $33k disc based transport. I think (and from personal experience) that disc based systems, however expensive or esoteric are on their way out.
Anyways in my case all I am trying to do is better my humble reference, the Ayon Cd2s, and if I can do that I will be more than satisfied.
Cheers,
Sid
Definitely they are on their way out.....I bought my first disc in the early 1980s! and like all things their life is now coming to an end. I have boxes of them under my bed, in the balcony and also in storage outside the city.
Technology has certainly moved on so price comparisons are sometimes surprising. That said, I think the comment section of the article is actually even more a fascinating read. I think it also helps (as many FM who understand the subjectivity of the original poster's test have contributed to the discussion) in putting the article and its findings in perspective.
No doubt one sees diminishing points of returns and to some it has come to a point where there is no actual difference. This perhaps is possible in the equipment chosen (a test of USB/SPDIF converters), but one has to keep in mind that it is a ranking of one person's opinion of overall sound quality. I have heard the Dcs stack perform shockingly well, but there is little doubt, one has to admit, that you can get closer to that special quality of reproduction for lesser money nowadays.
Regards
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Not to mention "owners bias" and "buyers envy". Anyways all these reviews are just references, for me the proof of the pudding lies in actually tasting it. And I can state confidently in my system the m2 tech evo on its own playing WAV's (without the PSU and clock) did not beat my Ayon cd2s playing CD's (wavs were ripped off these same Cd's), however it came staggeringly close (Using the internal DAC of the the Cd2s). So now I hope to surpass that with my new setup.
Cheers,
Sid
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Excellent ! This is what the whole hobby is all about. I was sitting listening to my system yesterday and thinking how good it sounds. Then I though perhaps I could make it better if I pulled the speakers a foot more away from the rear walls (and it did help) and then I emailed an audio designer friend in California (with pics of my system) to ask him how I could improve the density of my soundstage....haha.....but at the end I can say it still sounds great! What a confounding hobby!
However one has to admire him for these things:
1. To take the time out for the test.
2. To spend money or taking the trouble of borrowing all these converters.
3. To make a brave comparison to his own $33k DCS transport.
I would be hard pressed to find even a professional paid reviewer do all this, let alone have the "Ba!!s" to say that a DCS transport that costs 7x times more has been beaten. I would tend to listen to a person like this in this noisy, crowded "my opinion counts more", "my equipment is the best" type of people that tend to cluster towards this beautiful hobby of ours.
Cheers,
Sid
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Sorry to get this thread back on track.....do you not think it may be better to get a dedicated transport or CD player (for the reasons stated earlier as a back up) rather than going down the route of the OPPO? Perhaps you can borrow an OPPO to try it. it seems a risky proposition, unless it is more useful to have another DVD player available when it is not in use.
BTW, may I say intensely jealous of the LAMM and the Harbeths
(but I have probably said that before).
BTW, may I say intensely jealous of the LAMM and the Harbeths
(but I have probably said that before).Sid,
I agree with all the first three points. Bravo for taking the trouble to do so. But I think that your last point is precisely the point most of the commentators are making. In that he has his own price bias and therefore his opinion is as subjectively tainted as anyone else's.
But all in all a brave endeavor no doubt!
By the way, I honestly feel that my current digital file server based system truly sounds as good or even better than the dsc system I used to own (years ago when it was a small company north of London). It was very good at that time, but no doubt technology has moved on and prices have dropped.
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