BG_Digital_Source_Components_2012.pdf

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STEREO • MUSIC

DIGITAL SOURCE

COMPONENTS

Sponsored by

NuForce

GUIDE to

publisher.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jim Hannon

editor-in-chief

. . . . . . . . . . . Robert Harley

executive editor

. . . . . . . . . Jonathan Valin

acquisitions manager

and associate editor

. . . . . Neil Gader

music editor

. . . . . . . . . . . . Mark Lehman

creative director

. . . . . . . . Torquil Dewar

art director

. . . . . . . . . . . . . Shelley Lai

senior writers

. . . . . . . . . . . Anthony H. Cordesman

Wayne Garcia

Robert E. Greene

Jim Hannon

Ted Libbey

Chris Martens

Tom Martin

Dick Olsher

Andrew Quint

Paul Seydor

Steven Stone

Alan Taffel

reviewers &

contributing writers

. . . . . Duck Baker

Soren Baker

Greg Cahill

Garrett Hongo

Jacob Heilbrunn

Sherri Lehman

David McGee

Kirk Midtskog

Bill Milkowski

Derk Richardson

Karl Schuster

Jeff Wilson

nextscreen, LLC

chairman and ceo

. . . . . . . Tom Martin

vp/group publisher

. . . . . . Jim Hannon

advertising reps

. . . . . . . . Cheryl Smith

(512) 891-7775

Marvin Lewis

MTM Sales

(718) 225-8803

To sign up for Buyer’s Guides

alerts, click here

Address letters to the Editor:

The Absolute Sound,

8868 Research Blvd., Austin, TX 78758 or

rharley@nextscreen.com

Guide to Digital Source Components

www.theabsolutesound.com

Go to:

Contents

From the Editor

on the Horizon

Feature Articles

Disc Players

DACs

Music Servers & Accessories

Integrated Amps with USB DACs

Music Features

FROM THE

Editor

The Computer-Audio Revolution

I don’t know about you, but I find myself playing fewer and fewer CDs these days. It’s

not that I’m listening to music any less, but rather that I’m accessing that music

from a server rather than from physical media. This trend is accelerating as music

servers sound better, are easier to set up and use, and have become more convenient.

My favorite recent (for me) development is adding iPad control of my music system via Apple’s free

Remote app. My server is a bare-bones iMac running iTunes and Pure Music (the latter is essential, in

my view). Until I acquired an iPad, I had to choose music at the computer in the front of my room with a

mouse. Now I can sit in the listening chair and access my music library via the iPad’s brilliant interface. I

spend more time enjoying music and less time standing at the CD cabinet with my head turned sideways

looking for a particular disc. There’s no going back.

Despite the wholesale migration toward file-based music systems, I was surprised by an incident

involving a visiting loudspeaker manufacturer who was setting up a pair of speakers in my listening room.

After the speakers were roughly in place and we were about to listen to music for the first time, I showed

the speaker manufacturer my disc player, opened the drawer, handed him the remote control, and invited

him to play his reference discs so that he could dial-in the speakers’ positions. “Discs?” he snorted. “I

don’t play

discs.”

He proceeded to pull out his tiny laptop computer and ask me for a USB connection to

my DAC so that he could play his music from iTunes.

The world has embraced computer-based audio systems, but audiophiles have been a bit more

cautious. That’s because we refuse to compromise sound quality for convenience, and have generally

stuck with the tried-and-true until we’re sure that computer audio can deliver sound quality on par with

the best CD. That promise is now a reality: USB interfaces and USB cables have greatly improved;

software such as Pure Music gets the best possible sound from iTunes; today’s DACs offer

unprecedented performance and value; and storage is so cheap as to be virtually free.

With pennies-per-megabyte disc drives, there’s absolutely no need for lossy compression

formats such as MP3.

Computer audio is a powerful tool for accessing and enjoying music, not just because

of the convenience factor but for two other compelling attributes; the ability to buy music

downloads and the opportunity for listening to high-resolution digital. Browsing a music

store from your listening seat opens up a world of new musical discoveries, and high-

resolution digital offers a more involving listening experience than standard-definition

digital. Together downloads and high-res offer a powerful synergy.

Back in the 1990s when audiophiles were hoping for a better-sounding successor

to the compact disc, we had no idea that just around the corner lay the potential for

bypassing physical formats altogether. Establishing a new packaged-media format is an

unbelievably long and expensive process, with no guarantee that the format will succeed

in the marketplace. But the combination of computer audio and the Internet has given

us access to high-resolution digital audio without the need for a physical format. Instead

of waiting for record companies and hardware manufacturers to fight it out, often with

competing formats, we can instead download, 24 hours a day, high-resolution music to

our music servers right from the listening seat.

If that’s not a revolution, I don’t know what is.

Robert Harley

C li ck here to tu rn th e p ag e.

www.theabsolutesound.com

Guide to Digital Source Components

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