But it's also not the most practical option either in some cases. And I've a particular dislike of wasting a dealer's time to kick the tyres which is where good and meaningful reviews are a good barometer where testing and comparing gear at home isn't a workable option.
I have both an Oppo 205 and the Sony XA-5400ES. Listened to both analog stereo outputs extensively with CDs and SACDs. For music playback, I still mildly prefer the Sony. Especially on SACDs. That is no knock on the Oppo's output, it's easily the most refined audio player ever put out by Oppo. Granted, I've always loved the sound quality produced by the Sony. The differences are extremely subtle on CDs, and the Oppo may actually better the Sony depending on which filter option you pick. The Sony is slightly more "musical" with a little more weight blooming in the midrange. The Oppo offers a slightly more laidback presentation. That being said, I've had no issues placing the Oppo 205 as the centerpiece of my audio system. It just does so much more than the Sony that the tiny audio differences are a fair trade-off.
Um, no. I searched the forum for posts of yours containing "EISA" and found a scan of Paul Miller's capsule review of an iFi DAC you posted. I then went to AudioScienceReview and found Amir's review of the same DAC. There are no radical differences between their measurements. There are different types of measurements, but on the measurements that are easily comparable, they are in agreement. For example, Signal to Noise ratio: Miller found 108.3dB - while Amir found a virtually identical 107.9dB. In addition to being only 0.4dB different (well within unit-to-unit variation and run-to-run variation), it is also noteworthy that both findings differ notably from iFi's published spec of 116dB, further indicating that Amir's test was just as accurate and revealing as Miller's. Miller reports a series of distortion figures, in percentage form, at a variety of frequencies. Amir provides a full-frequency sweep of distortion in a graph, expressed in dB rather than percentage. Converting percentage to dB, Amir's distortion figures are similar to Miller's - and against the implication of your earlier "if you believe amps have performance no better than cassette decks" remark, if anything Amir's distortion measurements of the iFi DAC are slightly better than Miller's. Beyond that it's not apples to apples: Amir does several measurements showing both L and R channel performance while Miller's summary just reports a single figure. Amir also tests for intermodulation distortion, linearity, and a number of other factors that do not appear in Miller's summary. Now, what some people don't like is that in addition to distortion and noise measurements, Amir also posts a SINAD measurement: signal over noise and distortion. This is usually the first measurement in his reviews, and because it combines noise and distortion, it's always lower (worse) than a signal-to-noise measurement or a THD measurement. But that doesn't mean Amir doesn't know what he's doing - he runs the SINAD test properly, labels it clearly as SINAD, and also provides separate noise and distortion measurements. Similarly, he usually provides power output ratings at 1% THD, but he emphasizes power output capability up until the point when distortion starts shooting up rapidly, and that point is almost always less than 1% THD. It's a different way of presenting the data, but the 1% THD point is still there clear as day in his graphs. So he's not doing anything wrong. So your claim is false; your evidence does not prove what you say it does, and to the extent it proves anything, it proves the exact opposite of what you have claimed.
I am about to go to work so cannot post at length but will this evening. Quick things - SINAD is nonsense, you do not calculate THD findings from 9th order harmonics and ultrasonics, and you do not drive pre-amp stages to 4V.
Nothing really wrong with that list on the other site, although it'd have been useful if it held older DACs as well (e.g. the one that's in my 1993 Sony CDP-911E player for instance which is a brilliant performer against more contemporary gear, if only as I'd like to know!). Found this site useful, which goes into more detail on what's needed to fully test a DAC. https://www.evaluationengineering.com/instrumentation/article/13011757/testing-audio-adcs-and-dacs Interested parties can look at the excellent NWAVGuy site too (albeit no longer updated sadly). Lastly, Jim Lesurf's audio site, formerly (or maybe still at) St. Andrews University, also found at HFN from time to time, which is simple but informative. Information and Measurement
I gagged eating my breakfast this morning when I saw an Oppo UDP-205 (new in factory sealed box) listed on Audiogon for $4,699 and a region-free unit on eBay listed for $5,999.
They can run it up the flag pole, but it doesn’t mean anyone will salute! Even though it wouldn’t present a problem financially, I don’t just throw money around because I can. At 2-2.5K maybe room to negotiate, at 5-6K, no way, Jose!
OK.......now that's out of the way you can scratch my idea about connecting to analog Multi Channel inputs then. There aren't any!!!!......
Unless I find a reasonably priced OPPO 205, I think I’ll stick with the Panny 9000 and Sony Xa5400 combo. I don’t own a single dvd-a, so that has never been a consideration.
I know, I know, that listing a price doesn't mean anyone will buy it at that price. Maybe they think some ultra-wealthy person who doesn't care about price will come along and buy one because they heard it was "the best."
SINAD is not nonsense. I just came across a 30 year-old Stereophile amplifier review of a power amp that includes THD+noise measurements, which is what SINAD is. And whatever one's opinions might be of Stereophile's subjective reviews, I'm unaware of any significant criticism or doubts about the technical capabilities of J. Gordon Holt, John Atkinson, and the other individuals who have conducted the Measurements section of their reviews over the years. As for THD from ultrasonics, you know full well that Amir's reviews include measurements and graphs that show how ultrasonics contribute to THD, and he notes when ultrasonic frequencies are a main factor, and clarifies that they are not an issue. Ultrasonic info can also inform IMD measurements (since difference frequencies can be audible even if the intermodulating frequencies themselves are ultrasonic). Your 9th-order distortion comment is nonsense - THD is total harmonic distortion, which includes all orders. Ninth order is almost always vanishingly low and doesn't impact the measurements significantly one way or the other - and you know full well that Amir's graphs show the prominence of 2nd and 3rd order in almost every measurement, and that he usually notes specifically those particular harmonics in his commentary. This just seems like FUD to me. I'll look forward to your more detailed post later though.
It may be just my imagination running away from me but listening to iTunes from my laptop: Airport Express at 16/44.1, Creative Sound blaster X-FI HD at 24/96, or OPPO-205 at 24/192, the OPPO presents AAC and ALAC files up to 24/192 with distinguishable divergence in sound from the other aforementioned devices. Interestingly enough, most distinguishable are DOO WOP 50's and early 60's AAC tunes from the OPPO DAC to Pre-Pro, where I can sense tape splice edits. My question to OPPO-205 owners here, like you, is this phenonium I've imagined at all similar to any others here?
The Oppo 205 with its high end ESS Saber chip and multiple input options (including essentially all disc types) remains a strong platform for modifiers. Several are still offering them. I added a Oppomod LPS and some premium NOS tubes to my Modwright, and recently compared it to the Aqua La Scala II (on demo from a dealer), a highly regarded ~$8k DAC. I set everything up equally, used SPDIF coax from the Oppo to the Aqua, and could switch between the two using my remote control. This turned out to be a cable test, because when the same cables were used I could not tell a difference in the sound. Changing any cable, though, even the AC cable, and some small differences would emerge.
I can't say I've experienced what you've mentioned. I do not play any music from my laptop to the 205. I listen to CDs, DVD-As and Blu-ray Audio as well as music from hard drives. Most of the music on the hard drives are SACDs ripped using an Oppo 103.
That’s true, it does not. For example, the Marantz players are almost identical to the Denon players except for their cosmetics and the HDAM output stage. All other internal hardware is the same. Startlingly, the Denon players measure very well while the Marantz players measure poorly.
I like Denon and have a player that does DVD-Audio. In the UK do they have a player that can play DVD Audio, blu-ray audio, SACD, flac files 24/96, 24/192 etc and dsf files but also has analogue stereo outputs?
Sorry - very lengthy hours this past week so barely a moment's breath! So first of all there have been several attempts to replicate Amir's findings which, using similar equipment, proved impossible. One manufacturer (Arcam) went so far as to commission an independent consultant to duplicate his measurements and was unable to achieve the same results (although there was a suggestion as to why his results went so wrong - i.e. he made multiple errors): https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...v40-technical-review-15th-may-2020-pdf.72903/ Second he has returned some measurements which are simply implausible and strongly imply he does not understand the engineering/maths underpinning the processes he is trying to utilise. See for instance his Oppo 105 review here which concluded the player had basic linearity errors (which was not the finding of any other reviewer, see any of the multiple excellent reviews for this player online, or Paul Miller's very detailed lab report here - AV Tech, January 2013). Third his "noise" measurements he appears not to understand how to even perform or what he is suggesting in his findings. Noise measurements for equipment operate by taking a sample of different frequencies and weighting them (usually A-weighting) which returns a broadband SNR which is used to compare performance between different pieces of equipment. See this review of a NAD amplifier where he concludes it has a SINAD of 52dB - i.e. worse than vinyl or a mass-market analogue cassette player. There is simply no way NAD, a highly experienced and reputable company who have been building basic amplifiers and DAC stages for many years, were unable to get such basics right without the vast number of consumers noticing. The problem with his website is people (perhaps you, although I do not know how much of an engineering background you have) who do not understand the engineering behind what Amir is doing simply take at face value the presentation of graphs and assume they must be authoritative. This is why the more respectable end of the hifi journalism industry shares seriously adverse findings with the manufacturer before publishing (as, believe it or not, the manufacturer can often help you identify mistakes before you publish them). This is going somewhat off piste here - just to reassert my original statement that the Oppo 95/105/205 are some of the best players ever made, but do not represent good value at the prices the 205 currently sells for and can be outperformed by separates doing the same things. A brief (but useful) example is that the 105 could not sustain the DAC performance over SPDIF that it was able to when playing source media directly (see its jitter measurement below). That does not make it a "bad" DAC - it is in fact absolutely superb in just about every respect and only the very best stand-alone DACs can better it. But, they can better it.
I was there when Amir was at the forefront of the format war in Hi-Def video. I wouldn't take everything he says as the gospel truth. He tends to be a partisan in debates and will fudge things in his favor, for his own aims.
Thanks for your detailed reply. I don't want to get into an extended blow by blow defense of Amir, for the same reason that I'm not so interested in these dismissive "he will fudge results" claims - I'm not interested in ad hominem attacks, nor am I interested in defending the character of an individual whom I've never met in person. I will only say that I have read pretty extensively about the Arcam AV40 case and the PDF you've linked to does not address Amir's responses, which indicate that some of Arcam's assertions about what he supposedly did wrong are false. Not to mention that they claim he measured the device incorrectly because he failed to measure it at a lower, nonstandard output level "designed to match our [Arcam's] amplifiers" - even though another ASR user later pointed out that Arcam's own specs indicate that at least one of their amplifiers' peak performance comes when being fed a voltage much higher than the voltage at which the AV40 has peak performance. So Arcam's claim there was nonsense, even putting aside the fact that you don't measure a component at a custom, cherry-picked output level where it happens to perform best. That's not how honest measurements are done. More fundamentally, though, your argument about A-weighting and other factors repeats the usual pattern of criticism of Amir: folks lead with some version of the overarching claim that "Amir is incompetent" or "Amir is dishonest/shady" - and then it turns out there's actually no evidence of that, and instead what people are actually upset about is that Amir doesn't use A-weighting in his measurements, or he doesn't consult privately with manufacturers when measurements look poor, or he determines amplifier power by looking at where the amp starts to clip (where THD suddenly starts to shoot up rapidly) rather than by looking at where THD hits 1%. These are all about the presentation and interpretation of the results, and about conventions of courtesy associated with for-profit trade publications that accept and rely on manufacturer advertisement to stay in the black. They have nothing in fact to do with Amir being a charlatan or incompetent. I have no need or interest to say he's perfect or has never made an error - but his measurements are transparent, as it's quite simple to look at his graphs and see all the data regardless of which bits he highlights in his narrative - and there are far, far more instances where his measurements agree with those of highly established outlets like Stereophile than where they radically disagree with others' measurements. I suspect this exchange will never end unless I bow out, but IMHO I feel like it's run its course. As for the Oppo 205 being worth or not worth the current used-market/eBay prices, you know that I largely agree with your position on that, so I'd request that you not continue making that particular argument in responses to me since I'm not the one you're needing to argue with about that particular point. Thanks.
I would not say he is a dishonest, but I would say he doesn't seem to understand what he is commenting on or how the results have been arrived at and hence he doesn't realise when he is publishing misleading claims. The voltage output of consumer electronics are not arbitrarily selected by manufacturers to maximise their performance measurements under controlled conditions. As in most areas of consumer electronics design we have recognised industry standards which exist to allow components to interact with each other without disaster. For consumer products, line-level components are purposefully not designed to run at high voltage levels. There are some odd exceptions (Chord 2Qute, actually), but most line level components have similar VRMS outputs aligned to consumer standards (and the exceptions are usually done specifically in order to operate most effectively with an in-house power amp). Amir has unfortunately published repeatedly that manufacturers with decades of experience who have never gotten the basics wrong (DAC implementation etc) suddenly have begun making a mess of those things. This is simply not true. 20 years ago it was difficult to design and implement a DAC with low uniform correlated jitter, not least because most manufacturers could not reliably measure this. Now there are very few players, processors or DACs that perform badly here. The simple truth is that most of the digital engineering challenges of 20 years ago have been solved. We know how to do most things well now. Complexity, such as it is, arises in new challenges with room equalisation and building traditional, 'analogue' amplifiers within ever narrowing standards of acceptability arising from environmental regulations, particularly in Europe.
Well, I guess I was right that this probably won't end unless or until I bow out (or a Gort deletes our posts and tells us to stay on-topci! ). So look, I agree with you 100% that "most of the digital engineering challenges of 20 years ago have been solved." In fact, I find that a refreshing point of view here on these forums, where as you know that is not quite so accepted a view. So I commend you and agree with you, and am genuinely glad for your presence on this point since we are like-minded in that regard (and we are like-minded in our opinion that $2500 for an Oppo 205 in 2020 is not worth it ). But I do unfortunately have to disagree once again with your point about Amir - again, not because I am interested in defending his character, but rather because I don't agree that your narrative here is accurate. Preamp/processors are supposed to be able to operate at a wide variety of voltages, and there's nothing wrong with testing them all at a standard output level to enable apples-to-apples comparison. Also, 2v/4V is not excessive for an active pre/pro device. It's not even necessarily out of line for a line-level source component - CD players output 2V as a rule over their unbalanced outputs. Arcam's argument is that the AV40 should have been measured at, if memory serves, the very low and seemingly random output of 0.9V, because that's where it measures best. In fact, as I read Arcam's response to Amir, I didn't even read them as saying he'd measured it at the wrong output level - they only said that it performs better at a lower output level. That is important for two reasons: (1) they were actually agreeing with and affirming the measurement he got at the output voltage he used; and (2) their reasoning for why it should be measured at the output voltage where it just so happens to perform best was that Arcam power amps were designed to perform optimally with that low voltage level - but as noted above, that is not necessarily the case as at least one Arcam amp is documented to perform best at a much higher voltage level, even higher than (but also much closer to) the voltage level that Amir tested it at. Bottom line, I still do not believe you have provided evidence that Amir's testing method was wrong, flawed, or misleading. I would love to agree to disagree, if you are willing.
Could the discussion of reviewers and measurements of non Oppo components please be discussed in a different thread. Thanks .
Question specific to both an 83 and 103, since I never sprung the cash for the more expensive versions. I use the both units for music only using the stereo analog outs, and am happy with what I hear. In the interest of squeezing a bit more out of the players, would it make sense for me to purchase an HDMI embedder of some sort in order to bypass the limitations of the stereo analog outs? If so, will using the opitcal/coax outputs on the de-embedder still carry the full DSD signal, or should I find a de-embedder that can output to analog?
I have used de-embedders before. I think you'd be better served with a high quality, traditional DAC for use with the S/PDIF output of either player.
The GearFab D.BOB is a new type of de-embedder (somewhat pricey) which might serve his needs. Or there is a Bryston DAC which can accept DSD over HDMI from an Oppo or other compatible players (even more pricey, though). Both are high-end audiophile quality pieces
