why still buy a cd player?


I'm relatively new to the audiophile world, and I'm trying to understand why anone who has a sonos system (or alike) and has stored his files on a server in a lossless format would still want to buy a CD player for best audiophile music quality.

here's my thinking:

if a lossless rip format is used, the data stored after ripping on a digital hard-disk is as good as cd quality - by definition-,...

with sonos i can get that data anywhere in the house without errors

so the only thing that matters is the conversion from digital to analog and the follow-up amplification.

Now,

i can go from sonos to a pre-amp using a digital port, then the pre-amp determines the DAC quality.

or I go from sonos to an amp after using the DAC in the sonos (and use the analog connection to the amp)

If I were to have a CDP connected digitally to a pre-amp, the pre-amp DAC would determine the quality of the sound. In that case I might as well skip the CDP and fall back on my sonos and connect it digitally to my pre-amp.

So the only benefit from a CDP player would come from using the DAC and thus the analog out of the CDP. Is my logic correct?

If this is correct, than I would only have better sound quality with a CDP if the DAC of the CD player exceeds the quality of the DAC of my sonos and of my pre-amp. Is my logic correct?

If it is, and since I can imagine that most $500k CD would have better DAC than a sonos, the real comparison is to figure out of the DAC of my pre-amp is better than the DAC of my CDP. If it does, than no need for a cdp, just use sonos. If it doesn't then a cdp would still provide better quality. Is that correct?

So, the decision to by a
I can imagine that a good cdp would exceed the
mizuno

Showing 2 responses by audioholik

I'll be buying many of new APO SACD's next year (blue note and impulse series) as well as new 24/96 FLAC's ... so I'm definitely not interested in going back to low resolution compact disc players
Mapman,

right now I'm buying SACD's but next year I'll definitely add some 24/96 FLAC's to my collection...I hope that there will be more titles available in 2009, at least 6000 as it is in SACD catalogue

when it comes to 24/96 downloads you can check for example www.hdtracks.com , linn records, naim records which just recently announced its first hi rez recordings in stereophile
http://www.stereophile.com/news/121208naim_high-resolution/