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(Georg Grosz) wrote:

"Chelvam" wrote in message
news:YTeHc.47164$Oq2.3553@attbi_s52...
"Stewart Pinkerton" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 07 Jul 2004 07:08:11 GMT, "Chelvam"
wrote:

Yes, I have, and I've also worked in laser labs.

I wish with your expertise in laser and electronics and almost in every
High End brand you should come with an excellent budget CD Player of your
own. I will buy them.

Why re-invent the wheel? You can already get an excellent budget CD
player of your own at Target for less than $100 AFAIK. A few more
dollars gets you a digital AM/FM tuner in the bargain. That's going to
be my next stereo system -- an AM/FM/CD Discman on the bookshelf with
the power amp hidden in the basement.

For what its worth: in the mid- 80s-early90s I used to teach a course on
economics at Bellcore Tech which focused on technological change and
depreciation. Because many of the students were accountants, economists,
regulators, university students (including professors), public service
commission personnel along with others) I used the then-new compact disc player
as a great example of telecommunication technology that could be traced back to
early 1900s that was coming to vision at the user-level in available playback
machines that they had been enjoying in the telephone network for several
decades.

In the function of this course I would purchase at retail cd players and offer
them as a prize in a course-ending technology quiz. Because the course
development and management people wouldn't pay for the devices (not in their
budget) I bought them myself.

I purchased a few dozen cd players (remember that we are in the mid-late 80s)
and never paid more than $100 for a single one (all bought retail in local
stored in Chicago; no mail order devices) and I never found one that sounded
differently from my home reference device in bias controlled listening tests.

So can you find an inexpensive cd-player that won't compromise sound quality
..... you are goddamn right.

Follow-up?

Several years later PSACS conducted a follow-up test. We compared a prototype
Philips 1st Gen cd player and a portable player with a Sony ES (considered top
at that time) and found exactly ONE of ten enthusiasts was able to reliably
identify the Phillips from the Sony in 10 trials. Even then because the
start-up cycles were not closely synch'd even his results may be questionable.
And the 14-bit Philips was a prototype.

More interesting; nobody ....read not one subject was able to reliably identify
the portable (Radio Shack) from the reference.