Digital or Analog output?

[june]

Hello All,

Which do you prefer when using your CD player?

[peterS]

depends on the player and other equipment

i use the players DAC as there are no other in the signal chain

[locomk]

I prefer the analog outs of my cd player. depending on your preamp or receiver, it may have better dacs than your cd player. some receivers may take in a analog signal, but still convert it to digital and than back to analog, in this case, sending in a digital signal from your cd player may sound better than analog. as PeterS said, it all depends on the equipment.

[june]

Hello All,

I'm using Rotel's RCD-955 CD player & RSP-1068 pre-amp.

[gd]

Too close to call... try both.

[june]

Using analog currently with my Yamaha CDC-506. The Rotel RCD-955 arrives this Tuesday (04/04/06).

[Alloroc]

I use the analogue for both my Marantz DV8400 and my Esoteric. It'd like to try the firewire output on the Esoteric sometime though.... Anyone got any experience with that particular output?

[Snap]

If there is multi zone use of this CD player then use both. Use digital for the main room, and you will have to use analog for the multi zone stuff. I do not know of a receiver that lets you use the digital outs for zone 2 and 3. At least my RXV-1600 makes me use the analog for zone 2 and 3.

For anything else I just use the digital connections. (unless you are doing some SACD or stuff like that)

My .02 cents on the issue.

[june]

Hello All,

I did the jazz CD test this morning with the coaxial vs. analog outputs. And the winner is "COAXIAL." The coaxial was a little smoother and less brighter. Also I can recieve the "HDCD" signal if I play any HDCD's.

[Alaric]

Depends

No , not adult underwear. I borrowed a DAC and tried it with my SACD player and found my disk decoder seems to have a pretty good DAC built-in. I would have to guess it depends on your combination. Some EEs who frequent this forum claim a $200 CD player and a good DAC will out perform an expensive CD player. That was not my experience. I used what was supposed to be a very good MF DAC and found there is nothing wrong with my Marantz CD player. The only differences I heard I didn't consider an improvement. The permutations of equipment and personal taste make the question so open as to be unanswerable in any definitive fashion.

[Alaric]

The best advice I've gotten in this forum was from people who , after a time , understood my descriptions of the SQ of certain equipment , and could then point me towards stuff that was in the same vein. Gotta find folks who shared your experience and perception for that to work.