NightWoundsTime
A nice hunk of young man
- Joined
- Feb 15, 2004
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This is an attempt at a full fledged “shootout” style review. I’m taking plenty of time writing it (starting on July 11th), and hope to have full-fledged opinions by the time I post it. I have made knee-jerk reactions even in longer reviews on this forum and I wish to post only fully fledged ideas this time.
The sources:
What we’re dealing with here are budget sources. I originally bought the Terratec EWX 2496 as my first “real” source. At the time I had an atrocious Kenwood changer and knew I could do better.
Not long after buying the Terratec, board member GSFerrari convinced me to pick up a Sony DVP-685V SACD player. I got it for 180 at Circuit City as an open box discontinued model. I’ve fallen in love with SACD for its sound, and I’ve found a lot of great music in the limited SACD selection. It has been my real introduction to listening to classical, outside of the 15 years I played piano. Note that whatever wins this shootout, the Sony is staying with me for a good long while. The price of a higher end SACD system just isn’t worth it to me, and I’m more interested in PC audio at this junction.
Now just recently I’ve been searching for a much better source, and the EMU 1212M has fallen in my lap. At 165 from Guitar Center it seems like a good deal. It took me a bit of haggling to get that price, as I was talking to an Assistant Manager. Finally I told him I’d always done my shopping at Sam Ash but I really liked the looks of Guitar Center so if he’d cut me a deal I’d skip Sam Ash forever
My Setup:
Phones: HD-600 w/ Cardas replacement cable
Amp: Singlepower MPX3. This is pretty heavily upgraded, mostly in the area of capacitors.
IC’s. I’m using pretty low end monster cables. They are then connected to a Marantz 1060b which I’m using simply as a source switcher for these tests. I only have two inputs but since it’s a shootout I’m going to only do two at once. From the Marantz I have a Bear Labs Silver Lightning IC running to the MPX3. Not the greatest use of it but I don’t want to imbalance either source so for now it’s staying there. When I decide on the best source I’ll most often have the MPX3 directly connected to it with the Bear cable. If you read up on the Bear Labs ideology they claim that even though their cables are silver, they are neutral as possible. I can’t really comment since I’ve never done any serious cable comparisons.
All parts are connected to a Monster PC1000 clean power stage 2 strip. The Power on the MPX3 is supplied by a cheapo computer power chord.
The Method:
For each track I will rip the song to my hard drive using EAC in full secure
mode from a Plextor dvdRW. I may also do a few comparisons using cd’s in both sources, two burned copies. I’ll be using Foobar2k, newest version. With both cards I’ll be using 24bit 96khz upsampling, unless a particular piece of music seems to require 48khz. I’ve found that certain poorly recorded music can sound odd with upsampling. Output will be ASIO dll version. Dithering will be on with no noise shaping. The easiest comparisons here will be from the sound cards to the Sony, since I can start both at the same time and do some quick switching. When switching sound cards there can’t help but be a decent gap between playback. For this reason I’ll do the computer/CDP comparisons first so I have a decent impression of what I’m listening for. The final stage of soundcard vs soundcard may be the hardest but I’ll try my best. One final comparison just for kicks may be to hook up the Sony’s optical out to each of the sound cards and testing them as an external DAC.
The Music:
“Artist – Song Title –Album – Comments”
1. King Crimson – Fallen Angel (Red). Great song housed in a not-so-great recording. Still I like to judge my setup by being able to enjoy ANY of my music.
2. King Crimson – Level 5 (The Power to Believe). Much better recording and this one defines CRUNCH. Huge transients and lots of percussion makes it a great test of any source/amp combo.
3. Liszt – Annees De Pelerinage, 2nd annee: Italie, I. Sposalisio. This is a piece I played in high school and I just recently found a great recording of it. I’m all too familiar with the sound of solo piano
4. Blackalicious – Release (Blazing Arrow). Pretty nicely produced rap track. One of the few “epic” hip-hop undertakings ever. Over 10 minutes and takes place in three very different sections. Great stuff!
5. Marvin Gaye – Lets Get it On Hybrid SACD. Should be some real fun comparing the redbook performance of the soundcards to the Sony’s SACD playback.
6. Interpol – The New (Turn on the Bright Lights). Another poorly recorded album that always gets used when testing new equipment.
7. Bjork – Bachelorette (Homogenic) – Very congested track but well recorded so on the list it goes.
8. Mahler Symphony No 5 Part I "Sturmisch Bewegt, mit grosster vehemenz". Another hybrid SACD.
9. Sam Cooke – A Change Is Gonna Come (Ain’t That Good News). Yet another hybrid SACD.
Does this look diverse enough for everyone? It’s actually fairly representative of my normal music listening believe it or not.
The audio shootout starts soon, but first; some Interface/feature Comparisons:
Obviously the Sony is a great standalone player when it comes to functionality. It doesn’t have the weird glitches I’ve seen in many other standalone players (the infamous 963SA SACD reading glitch being a good example). I’ve been pretty happy with this player and the way it handles various formats. Fully understanding the menus on this one is a definite necessity. I personally like the fact that you can make 2-channel playback on SACD’s a universal standard. This really bugged me about a particular Marantz player I used that had to be reset to 2-channel each time the disc was changed.
The Terratec is an extremely well designed pc audio device. Its control panel is very easy to use and it works seamlessly with any type internal audio source you throw at it. Going from waveout/directsound 44.1khz to foobar upsampled kernel streaming or ASIO is no problem. A minor problem is that the ASIO is slightly unstable and requires a lot of tweaking to eliminate skipping or glitches. One excellent feature is that the Terratec can support 96khz through waveout/directsound channels. This might not seem so important to some, but I’ve discovered that Windvd can play DVD-A discs with full 96khz output to the Terratec. On top of that there’s win-dvd’s dolby headphone enhancement. Most discs I’ve tried have sounded lovely (with the exception of Metallica’s self titled album and Outkast’s “Stankonia”. Both of these exhibited some clipping that I was never able to eliminate. I chalked it up to mixing and the fact that Windvd was never intended to run with the Terratec. Instead it claims that the ONLY audio device it will decode to 96khz for is the top end Creative card. The terratec’s control panel shows a 96khz input though when everything is set up right, so that plus my ears judgement tells me that windvd isn’t holding back a thing.)
Which brings us to the EMU. Whatever sound quality it brings to the table, this thing is still a beast to use. Even the installation is hard, with two cards linked by a large ribbon type cable. Space is pretty tight in my PC and I got pretty frustrated trying to make everything go together. I ended up having to remove my hard drives to get everything in place. As many have noted, the interface for the EMU is pretty horrid for us audiophiles. It’s aimed at professional musicians and hobbyists, and for recording it’s probably great. But for those of us who just want good sound, it can be challenging. Everything on the panel is made to look like a mixing desk. You load up/create a desk based on your sample rate and what kinds of features you’ll be using. For windows waveout/directsound or non-resampled Foobar you use a 44.1/48khz scheme. The “Product Default” is pretty simple… windows waveout comes through a single channel on the mixer interface and everyone’s happy. Now try setting up foobar for ASIO and upsampling. Instantly the control panel pops up “Another application has caused a sample rate change that makes the current session invalid.” Ok, fine, I’ll load up a 96khz profile (by this point I’ve made ultra simplistic layouts for each sampling rate I use so that they can be easily loaded from files.) Fine, we’re off and running in foobar. But wait, now I’m browsing the internet and want to watch a video clip. Ok pause foobar and load up the 44.1khz profile again. Now when I want to go BACK to foobar I have to reload the 96khz. Is this getting confusing yet? You get used to it but a control panel that can seamlessly skip between sample rates would have been very nice. One excellent feature on this card is that the ASIO is much more stable than Terratec’s implementation. Unlike the Terratec, the EMU does not support waveout/directsound formats over 44.1 or 48khz (so no windvd/dvd-a goodness).
*Ok I’m posting this all tonight so that the review isn’t too much in finished form. I’m still in the process of ripping the music tracks but that should be done by tomorrow and I’ll have the first round of these tests up soon.*
The sources:
What we’re dealing with here are budget sources. I originally bought the Terratec EWX 2496 as my first “real” source. At the time I had an atrocious Kenwood changer and knew I could do better.
Not long after buying the Terratec, board member GSFerrari convinced me to pick up a Sony DVP-685V SACD player. I got it for 180 at Circuit City as an open box discontinued model. I’ve fallen in love with SACD for its sound, and I’ve found a lot of great music in the limited SACD selection. It has been my real introduction to listening to classical, outside of the 15 years I played piano. Note that whatever wins this shootout, the Sony is staying with me for a good long while. The price of a higher end SACD system just isn’t worth it to me, and I’m more interested in PC audio at this junction.
Now just recently I’ve been searching for a much better source, and the EMU 1212M has fallen in my lap. At 165 from Guitar Center it seems like a good deal. It took me a bit of haggling to get that price, as I was talking to an Assistant Manager. Finally I told him I’d always done my shopping at Sam Ash but I really liked the looks of Guitar Center so if he’d cut me a deal I’d skip Sam Ash forever
My Setup:
Phones: HD-600 w/ Cardas replacement cable
Amp: Singlepower MPX3. This is pretty heavily upgraded, mostly in the area of capacitors.
IC’s. I’m using pretty low end monster cables. They are then connected to a Marantz 1060b which I’m using simply as a source switcher for these tests. I only have two inputs but since it’s a shootout I’m going to only do two at once. From the Marantz I have a Bear Labs Silver Lightning IC running to the MPX3. Not the greatest use of it but I don’t want to imbalance either source so for now it’s staying there. When I decide on the best source I’ll most often have the MPX3 directly connected to it with the Bear cable. If you read up on the Bear Labs ideology they claim that even though their cables are silver, they are neutral as possible. I can’t really comment since I’ve never done any serious cable comparisons.
All parts are connected to a Monster PC1000 clean power stage 2 strip. The Power on the MPX3 is supplied by a cheapo computer power chord.
The Method:
For each track I will rip the song to my hard drive using EAC in full secure
mode from a Plextor dvdRW. I may also do a few comparisons using cd’s in both sources, two burned copies. I’ll be using Foobar2k, newest version. With both cards I’ll be using 24bit 96khz upsampling, unless a particular piece of music seems to require 48khz. I’ve found that certain poorly recorded music can sound odd with upsampling. Output will be ASIO dll version. Dithering will be on with no noise shaping. The easiest comparisons here will be from the sound cards to the Sony, since I can start both at the same time and do some quick switching. When switching sound cards there can’t help but be a decent gap between playback. For this reason I’ll do the computer/CDP comparisons first so I have a decent impression of what I’m listening for. The final stage of soundcard vs soundcard may be the hardest but I’ll try my best. One final comparison just for kicks may be to hook up the Sony’s optical out to each of the sound cards and testing them as an external DAC.
The Music:
“Artist – Song Title –Album – Comments”
1. King Crimson – Fallen Angel (Red). Great song housed in a not-so-great recording. Still I like to judge my setup by being able to enjoy ANY of my music.
2. King Crimson – Level 5 (The Power to Believe). Much better recording and this one defines CRUNCH. Huge transients and lots of percussion makes it a great test of any source/amp combo.
3. Liszt – Annees De Pelerinage, 2nd annee: Italie, I. Sposalisio. This is a piece I played in high school and I just recently found a great recording of it. I’m all too familiar with the sound of solo piano
4. Blackalicious – Release (Blazing Arrow). Pretty nicely produced rap track. One of the few “epic” hip-hop undertakings ever. Over 10 minutes and takes place in three very different sections. Great stuff!
5. Marvin Gaye – Lets Get it On Hybrid SACD. Should be some real fun comparing the redbook performance of the soundcards to the Sony’s SACD playback.
6. Interpol – The New (Turn on the Bright Lights). Another poorly recorded album that always gets used when testing new equipment.
7. Bjork – Bachelorette (Homogenic) – Very congested track but well recorded so on the list it goes.
8. Mahler Symphony No 5 Part I "Sturmisch Bewegt, mit grosster vehemenz". Another hybrid SACD.
9. Sam Cooke – A Change Is Gonna Come (Ain’t That Good News). Yet another hybrid SACD.
Does this look diverse enough for everyone? It’s actually fairly representative of my normal music listening believe it or not.
The audio shootout starts soon, but first; some Interface/feature Comparisons:
Obviously the Sony is a great standalone player when it comes to functionality. It doesn’t have the weird glitches I’ve seen in many other standalone players (the infamous 963SA SACD reading glitch being a good example). I’ve been pretty happy with this player and the way it handles various formats. Fully understanding the menus on this one is a definite necessity. I personally like the fact that you can make 2-channel playback on SACD’s a universal standard. This really bugged me about a particular Marantz player I used that had to be reset to 2-channel each time the disc was changed.
The Terratec is an extremely well designed pc audio device. Its control panel is very easy to use and it works seamlessly with any type internal audio source you throw at it. Going from waveout/directsound 44.1khz to foobar upsampled kernel streaming or ASIO is no problem. A minor problem is that the ASIO is slightly unstable and requires a lot of tweaking to eliminate skipping or glitches. One excellent feature is that the Terratec can support 96khz through waveout/directsound channels. This might not seem so important to some, but I’ve discovered that Windvd can play DVD-A discs with full 96khz output to the Terratec. On top of that there’s win-dvd’s dolby headphone enhancement. Most discs I’ve tried have sounded lovely (with the exception of Metallica’s self titled album and Outkast’s “Stankonia”. Both of these exhibited some clipping that I was never able to eliminate. I chalked it up to mixing and the fact that Windvd was never intended to run with the Terratec. Instead it claims that the ONLY audio device it will decode to 96khz for is the top end Creative card. The terratec’s control panel shows a 96khz input though when everything is set up right, so that plus my ears judgement tells me that windvd isn’t holding back a thing.)
Which brings us to the EMU. Whatever sound quality it brings to the table, this thing is still a beast to use. Even the installation is hard, with two cards linked by a large ribbon type cable. Space is pretty tight in my PC and I got pretty frustrated trying to make everything go together. I ended up having to remove my hard drives to get everything in place. As many have noted, the interface for the EMU is pretty horrid for us audiophiles. It’s aimed at professional musicians and hobbyists, and for recording it’s probably great. But for those of us who just want good sound, it can be challenging. Everything on the panel is made to look like a mixing desk. You load up/create a desk based on your sample rate and what kinds of features you’ll be using. For windows waveout/directsound or non-resampled Foobar you use a 44.1/48khz scheme. The “Product Default” is pretty simple… windows waveout comes through a single channel on the mixer interface and everyone’s happy. Now try setting up foobar for ASIO and upsampling. Instantly the control panel pops up “Another application has caused a sample rate change that makes the current session invalid.” Ok, fine, I’ll load up a 96khz profile (by this point I’ve made ultra simplistic layouts for each sampling rate I use so that they can be easily loaded from files.) Fine, we’re off and running in foobar. But wait, now I’m browsing the internet and want to watch a video clip. Ok pause foobar and load up the 44.1khz profile again. Now when I want to go BACK to foobar I have to reload the 96khz. Is this getting confusing yet? You get used to it but a control panel that can seamlessly skip between sample rates would have been very nice. One excellent feature on this card is that the ASIO is much more stable than Terratec’s implementation. Unlike the Terratec, the EMU does not support waveout/directsound formats over 44.1 or 48khz (so no windvd/dvd-a goodness).
*Ok I’m posting this all tonight so that the review isn’t too much in finished form. I’m still in the process of ripping the music tracks but that should be done by tomorrow and I’ll have the first round of these tests up soon.*
