Prices of HEAD UNITS

[swathyd]

How we do know whether a set has got burr brown decorders or not. Does kenwood kdc-x9006u got it ?

[sk456]

Originally Posted by low_bass_makker

But it only plays CD not MP3

LBM no use going down that road again... but then again if one is wanting Burr brown decoders..mp3 really IMO would be a waste...

[low_bass_makker]

Originally Posted by sk456

HU with burr brown decoders will not come in 10k budget....
You can look at kenwood KCD-01...twin burr browns...pure sq..no frills..no blings...no eq...jsut solid SQ.... should cost abt 20-25K now ( if u can get one )....Very very classy

Originally Posted by low_bass_makker

But it only plays CD not MP3

Originally Posted by sk456

LBM no use going down that road again... but then again if one is wanting Burr brown decoders..mp3 really IMO would be a waste...

Sir if you have clearly read that I am telling that the HU you recommended DOES NOT PLAY MP3 thats all. Did i mentioned the comparison any place....

Also having burr browns does not mean that the HU is having excellent SQ, there are other factors involved also.

I am not going that road you are asking for the same

[Autophile]

Originally Posted by low_bass_makker

Also having burr browns does not mean that the HU is having excellent SQ, there are other factors involved also.

What other factors are you talking about ???

[low_bass_makker]

Originally Posted by Autophile

What other factors are you talking about ???

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/500655-post63.html (Audio CD vs 320kbps mp3.. etc.,)

Originally Posted by Autophile

Inside the HX-D2 the following components are used.

- 4 X Burr Brown 1793, K-Grade 24Bit/192KHz DAC's
- 96KHz upsampling using AKM DSP and FIR digital filter.
- 0.5 step Burr Brown volume pot
- 4 layer circuit board and 6N copper output RCA's.
- High Precision CD transport and pickup mechanism

Clarion has spent a lot of money and R&D on the above mentioned parts / components and because of these parts this HU is expensive and offers very high level of SQ in CD playback.

As you commented your self...

Also few of the member have said some thing about the internals of the HU and how the manufacture fool the customer

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/501286-post19.html (Clarion HUs discussion!)

Originally Posted by santosh.s

I can't resist posting here in a nice debate.

ALL companies are there to make money, and that applies not just to audio. They are not doing social service, so they can't be expected to operate on non-profit basis. Just like they hire hyper-brains to take on the challenge of designing technically excellent products, they also have another set of super-brains to study the market/competition, analyze different market segments and diversify their product line to cater to all those segments. The target is to maximize the bottom line. It is very likely that the segment, which these purist HUs are positioned for, may include those who would buy it because it does NOT play mp3 or divx (thereby proving the point that they are indeed pure!).

Brand name is a MAJOR factor. Burr Brown DAC/ADC chips mentioned earlier are now made by TI (Texas Instruments) because they had bought BB. But they still continue to keep the name BB because that is a bigger name for intended customers. If they take that tag off, it will surely have an adverse impact on their sales. On the other hand, if BB was some unknown company but with same quality of products (say a Chinese one!), they would have definitely renamed those chips under TI banner after the takeover. I know such components which enjoy this level of brand image are easily sold at profit margins as high as 80%.

I have an interesting fact to share about some audio related chips. They have two flavors of a certain audio feature. One has SNR (signal to noise ratio) of 120dB or so, which is extremely good, highly "audiophile". The lower flavor has 20-30dB lesser. What I wanted to tell here is that -the lower version is actually nothing but the higher version plus some significant extra circuitry to add artificial noise to it- can you believe it? When you see products (especially electronics) with 3-4 variants with different sub-sets of features, it is very likely that the hardware and software therein is same for all of them, which obviously corresponds to the top most variant. Others just have a few of the features disabled so as to sell them at lower price ranges. Though I definitely feel that all these tricks are not high on morality/ethics, no one can blame them or accuse them of doing anything wrong as long as they don't force customers to buy their products at knife or gun point. This is probably the meaning of "healthy" competition in a "free" economy!!

Originally Posted by tsk1979

This thing is done on many chips, ranging from broadband to Signal processing etc.,
So what the company does is make a chip with all capabilities.
The same chip is sold crippled in an economy market, and in a high end market its sold at more price.
Earlier companies used to just software cripple, but now the package is also crippled.
For example a networking company makes a network processor which has 4 Ethernet ports 2 USB ports, 3 UART etc., etc.,
If you go to a cheaper market you would sell the same chip in a package which is just 2 ethernet ports instead of 4, and its sold at a lower price point.
To make a 4 port package or a 2 port package the cost is the same, but the market dynanimics dictate that the lower priced chip is sold with fewer features.
This is very very common.
A very famous example is the Canon 300D camera which is software crippled. Many hackers released "many features".

When you come to HU Signal processors many times a HU costing twice as much as the lower spec model will have the same signal processor but crippled.

What santosh.s said about noise, used to be true, but since DSP programming has become so common now, and ARM cores and MIPS core programming is also getting common, along with knowledge base of internet, there is not much use of software crippling since somebody will break it and release the code.
So now its more of a hardware crippling too.
Use the same DSP, but use a lower spec supporting components like caps and inductors, so that even with software hack you are not able to do much.

So it thing you must have got my point now.

[Autophile]

The DAC chip has major influence over the sound supported by good transport, circuit, power supply etc etc.

The manufacturers who are using Burr Brown know what they are looking for in sound reproduction and they are not stupid to plonk the chip alone. They concentrate on the transport, power supplies etc too.

Kenwood K-CD01 is the best SQ unit I have come across in that price range. And it sounds way better than Kenwood 8529 which was the top of the line unit.

Kenwood K-CD01 runs on Burr Brown 1793 DAC chips similar to HX-D2. And there is no denying because of "what" these units sound so superior from others.

[swathyd]

pioneer premier 880 prs also has burr brown, what do you know about it ?

[sk456]

Originally Posted by swathyd

pioneer premier 880 prs also has burr brown, what do you know about it ?

Even though im not good wth the techie numbers.... I had briefly auditioned its Asian cousin the P-80 soem tie ago...... Surprisingly for Pioneer it was quite warm sounding..... I thought it was one of the few nice pioneer HU's...
Even though im not too sure about its pricing I think it would be quite good VFM...

[Bass&Trouble]

Originally Posted by sk456

Surprisingly for Pioneer it was quite warm sounding.....

I second that.

Although I had heard the 80RS before installing it in our own car, I was a bit skeptical about how it would perform over the Alpine 9855 that preceded it, and I must say its doing a rather fine job.

[Autophile]

The system must be sounding smoother and less harsher along with great improvement in midrange than the outgoing 9855.

[navin]

Originally Posted by Autophile

The system must be sounding smoother and less harsher along with great improvement in midrange than the outgoing 9855.

JB, the 9855 is not a good Alpine unit. i think Alpine seriously goofed on that product line. Maybe the present line 9881, 9883 etc... will restore Alpines credibility.

LBM, just becuase TI owns Burr Brown it does not make Burr Brown DAC suddenly bad. TI has bought the company along with most of the engieers, manfacturing etc..and will be foolish to ruin a good thing.

[Autophile]

Yeah hope the new series is better. Even the outgoing reference CDA-9857 was good.

[low_bass_makker]

Originally Posted by navin

LBM, just becuase TI owns Burr Brown it does not make Burr Brown DAC suddenly bad. TI has bought the company along with most of the engieers, manfacturing etc..and will be foolish to ruin a good thing.

Sir I was saying that if the HU has a BB it does not mean it will have good SQ output. Many be current Sony HU have the BB in them.

[Autophile]

Originally Posted by low_bass_makker

Sir I was saying that if the HU has a BB it does not mean it will have good SQ output. Many be current Sony HU have the BB in them.

LBM what is SQ output?

The HU with BB DAC Chips will definitely offer better SQ than the ones with regular DAC chips.

The upcoming Sony HU's will sound better than the outgoing models. I have noticed that new Sony MEX-DV2000 (With BB) sounds much better than the outgoing Sony MEX-R1.

[swathyd]

So which set should i go for ? Sony or pioneer p880 ? Many shops in tvpm has asked me to avoid sony, they told it is very unreliable.