由 Richard Chen 發表於 週六 4月 06, 2002 4:32 pm
I have things to say, but am in a hurry. Since I type mandarin slow, I'll use english.
I finally got the USHER CD-100 today!
I tried its performance on the following platform:
Sennheiser HD 600 + Philips 189NT$ headphone:SBC-HL125 (this was just for fun)
Ms. Ho's hand-made analogue interconnect
ATH-HA2 Headphone amplifier
What I want to say most is for those of you looking for a well interpreted sound from your headphone system, I'm speaking solely of tonal quality and display of detail (not sound stage or specific performance of a certain range or clarity), the source has the most significant impact on the characteristic of the sound you hear. Many times, a bad sound (maybe due to the DAC function's capabilities) is almost impossible to compensate with things like headphones and headphone amps. This is not to say they are not important factors determining the sound you hear, but think of if as the situation of storytelling. If the author did wrote the story/novel poorly, despite how beautiful the voice of the story teller, or his/her skill of interpreting literature with voice, the audience will not like the message the story conveys. In my opinion, based on the tests I've run on comparing various aspects of equipments (of different price range), the source is like the book and headphones and headphones amps the story teller. Of course, there is no right sound to get from your system, so at times, the headphone or the amp becomes the focus. However, I see the source as the "second author" of the book, and headphone and headphone amps serve as "honest" messengers. My opinions were based on the low-end headphone of Philips, where the tonal quality did not differ from the HD 600 except for clarity of certain instrumental voice. Before trying the CD-100 with my HD 600, on my Philips, the soloists of the CD's I tested on sounded about 30% different than they did when my source was an AIWA walkman......
Another advantage I realized about an improved source is that with the improved clarity, you can go ahead and listen to music at a softer volume than you are used to on a lower quality source.
It was the "honesty" of HD 600 why I chose it, but is was the money in my pocket left why I chose the ATH-HA2.