caf (04/06/83)
Last night I dropped by my frieldly local audio salon (Chelsea Audio) and auditioned their Sony CD player and one and only Compact Disc. By felicitious chance, the disc was a sampler of M&K Realtime's classical music which duplicates cuts on several of my DBX encoded records. Since my DBX records were miles away there was no immeadiate oppurtunity for an A-B test, but I was able to listen carefully. (Any Real audiophile will tell you that is much more valid than A-B testing anyway.) The setup at the shop consisted of a MAC preamp and 250 watt/ch amp feeding a somewhat expensive pair of free standing ADS speakers. The listening level was limited on the high end by the powerful bass recorded on this disk and on the low end by noise from air conditioning. To recalibrate my ears after this repast, I listened (and watched) a "Live from Lincoln Center" simulcast that was cruelly limited and distorted by the time it left the KOAP-FM transmitter. Finally I played some of the same selections on the DBX records. On much of the material, there was surprisingly little difference. Both CD and DBX versions had a powerful low bass with an awesome dynamic range. Compared to conventional LP, neither CD nor DBX is constrained to limit the bass in any way in order to keep the needle from popping out of a groove or to override rumble. Some reviewers refer to a "lifting of a layer of gauze" effect when upgrading to CD discs. Presumably this is a result of the greatly improved s/n ratio of CD or DBX. Compared to CD, DBX has (maybe!) some problems with highly precussive insturments; castanets againgst a silent background are difficult to handle. Fortunately for DBX fans, such material is rare. My overall impression is that DBX gives about 90 per cent of the musical improvement that CD does (compared to LP). As a result, I plan to continue avoiding purchase of new LP's of symphonic music untill Pioneer comes out with their combination CD/Laservision player within a year or so. If new DBX records (with suitable material) come out, I will not hesitiate to buy them if the price is reasonable. With the considerable improvement in sound afforded by DBX, CD and (reportedly) Beta Hi-Fi, the onus will be on Laservision supporters to upgrade the sound on LV's to match the others. Whether the problem will be solved by replacing the CX compansion used on laser discs with DBX, or by some other means, or not at all, remains to be seen. I certainly should like to have a videodisc of that Pavorotti (sp?) concert with a clean sound track! Chuck Forsberg