Playing a CD in Laptop vs CD Player

Vivek Batra

Well-Known Member
Joined
Mar 13, 2019
Messages
1,278
Points
113
Location
Chandigarh
Hi FMs

I am planning to buy a CD player for my stereo setup. I never owned a CD player in the past. I am curious to know if playing an audio CD in the Laptop drive is different than playing via CD player. Will there by any quality/processing issues? I did that with Laptop but have no CD player to compare the results. If anyone out there has any experience on it that would greatly help me.

Thanks.
 
Yes a cd player is definitely better than a laptop drive.
A laptop drive is a compromise.
And if you plan to get better amplification, a cd player will provide better sound.
 
Hi guys thanks a lot for your inputs and educating me. I am convinced now that CD player is always better than a laptop drive.

Thanks again to all of the FMs
 
A transport is a transport. It will read or not read. An entry level CD player will get beaten easily by a laptop and a good dac. Unless you listen to only CD and not any other digital sources, you're better off getting a dac and using it with your laptop. With a CD player, you are stuck with a transport, and modern CD player transports are not significantly better than your average laptop drive. I have an onkyo c7030 which had it's laser fail in just a couple of years, while my Magnavox with a CDM 4/19 still reads CD's like a champ. My laptop with a dac beats the Magnavox and another Sony high end DVD player I have and is almost as good as the onkyo, while being more versatile.
 
Last edited:
Sharing my experience with all
I played same track from the audio cd in the laptop DVD drive and then same track from digital file (wav) ripped from same CD
Software for both kind of playback was same i.e.foobar and being send to dac via USB

For me the digital file playback was clear winner . Playing the audio cd from DVD drive was falling short in all departments

But it surely was not absolutely bad and would probably be better then absolutely entry level CD player

Will compare it some day with my Sony bdp s380
 
Sharing my experience with all
I played same track from the audio cd in the laptop DVD drive and then same track from digital file (wav) ripped from same CD
Software for both kind of playback was same i.e.foobar and being send to dac via USB

For me the digital file playback was clear winner . Playing the audio cd from DVD drive was falling short in all departments

But it surely was not absolutely bad and would probably be better then absolutely entry level CD player

Will compare it some day with my Sony bdp s380
Thanks for shedding some more light on this.
 
With a CD player, you are stuck with a transport
That's true. My Marantz CD player had bad laser issue twice in 8 years of working. Luckily it has a USB port which can read WAV files. I now use CDrips through USB and as @rikhav mentioned it sounds as good as the Marantz transport
 
laptop + DAC will be my first choice.. basic DAC will also fine
without DAC, laptop sounds poorer than CD player.. even poorer than DVD/BD player..
in my knowledge, dont buy budget CD player.. i compared some budget CD player with sony BD player using same CD.. the difference is very very little.. or almost same..

and one more thing , if you using laptop.. softwares also playing main role.. i used AUDACITY and I TUNES in apple mac mini.. sounds from I TUNES are little boosted.. i used audacity only for listening music..

-suresh
 
Not everybody likes the external DAC sound. Personally, I don't. For me, the first choice is always a dedicated cd player. I don't intend to confuse Vivek Bhatra, but I suggest you listen to both the options and decide. And unfortunately, good DACs are very expensive, and those are the ones which makes some improvement in sound. As i told you, I never could cope with a DAC sound.
absolutely right mr. preth. i have listen more than 5 external dacs and my experience is all dacs sound signature diffrent and not suitable for everyone. spcially benchmark dac 2 and emotiva's dac sound wonderfull for me.. but i'm not a dac guy right now, i manage it on my technics cd player
 
DAC is even there on regular CD player, DVD player , BD player , high end CD player
Just that an external dac would be like having separates like pre and power, dac or analogue stage having their PSU and cabinet

Thwre is nothing like a special sound with external dacs.

Like all equipment all dacs have a unique sound of theirs.

There would be dedicated CDP which would sound better or will have even better specs then an external DAC

You have to decide what works best for you at your given budget and what all options are available at your given budget
 
Back
Top