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Is it the transport or DAC that enables HDCD/Red?

Good morning all,
I am new to transports and seperate DAC's. I recently purchased a Parasound CBD 2000 Belt Drive Transport and am looking to buy a DAC.

However, I am not sure what signal the transport is to provide in order for me to play HDCD as well as Redbook CD's. Should I expect the transport to provide the HDCD and Redbook signal or does the DAC do all the work?

Does balanced in/outputs produce a better sound than does regular RCA in/outputs?

Right now I am looking for a compact DAC (the smaller the better) that offers good to excellent sound for not a lot of money. I listen to classical (choral/orchestral) and jazz music. I love the human voice and large scale orchestral and choral works.

What shoud I be looking for since this is all a mystery to me at this point. I am just being honest. I really don't know what's happening in this area. By the way, I would be pleased if you would offer some of your choices please.

Finally, I am reading more so that I can learn more. Thanks so much for your understanding and input. Have a great and wonderful day and weekend.
rbwinterlink
dracule1
1,085 posts
 
I believe there is a specialized chip for HDCD decoding (Pacific Microsonics), usually located in the DAC or CD player unit.
kjweisner's avatar
kjweisner
293 posts
 
I can confirm that HDCD takes place in the DAC, enabling you to use your choice of transport. In fact, in addition to using a dedicated transport (Rotel RDD980), a CD/SACD player (Marantz 8260) and a network player (Airport Express), all three stream their signal to an old Assemblage DAC-2, and in all cases the HDCD indicator lights up with an HDCD encoded track is playing.
swanny76109
382 posts
 
If the transport decodes HDCD and the DAC does not and you feed the digital signal to the DAC, you won't get HDCD decoding. If the transport does not and the DAC does and you feed the digital signal to the DAC it will decode HDCD.

In my instance my older Rotel transport does decode HDCD but my DAC does not. So, if I want HDCD decoding, I can use my analog outputs to my preamp and listen that way. But I find the DAC sounds better even without the decoding.

The older generation DACs offer HDCD, but I think most newer ones do not.
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nsgarch's avatar
nsgarch
2,524 posts
 
Yes, HDCD capability is (or isn't) in the DAC. All transports supply the information off the disc, Redbook or HDCD. DAC's themselves almost universally employ a D to A chip of some kind. Some are better than others, but if they DON'T do HDCD, then the extra digital information for HDCD processing (of an HDCD disc) is disregarded (basically dumped.) Otherwise, on HDCD implemented DAC or CDP, a Pacific Microphonics chip is used which WILL recover the HDCD info. The problem is that the Pacific Microsonic chips aren't the highest quality, which is why most hi-end DAC's/players don't do HDCD. That is, except for Mark Levinson, which got permission to make THEIR OWN high quality HDCD decoding chips under additional license from Pacific Microsonics.

One other (high end) exception is Wadia. Unlike Mark Levinson, they do not use a custom HDCD chip. In fact Wadia DAC's don't use ANY D/A "chip" in the usual sense. Wadia uses their (claim to fame) patented "Digimaster" decoding software. Basically, Wadia DAC's are really high speed computers using the proprietary software to decode digital audio data. For that reason, the HDCD information is not dumped, but processed by the software. So although you won't get an "HDCD" indicator light on a Wadia, you WILL get the best HDCD perfomance (I've heard.) Is it better than the Levinson's custom HDCD chip. I haven't heard the Levinson, but the Wadia HDCD reproduction is truly amazing.
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