March 26, 2012

  • Adcom GCD-700, Part 13

    20 years ago, many of my friends were on college spring break.  When we were in high school, movies were it.  But now, some of us went to concerts and Broadway shows.  Alas, when we bought "live" albums, they often sounded horrible.  As many of you know, I always cite Dokken's Beast From The East as a prime offender.

    Well, in the early 90s, Donald Fagen (of Steely Dan fame) came out of semi-retirement, gathered some of his friends, and played some gigs.  So about 20 years go, my friends got a hold of The New York Rock And Soul Revue's Live At The Beacon.  Even though we had mid-fi systems, we could tell that this was a superior recording.  Even though we did not have "audiophile" vocabulary to describe sonics, we knew that, first of all, the album wasn't as LOUD as regular pop music recordings.  That meant we could actually turn the volume control up from MIN, without getting blasted out of the room. 

    My housemate Todd remarked, "There seems to be so much space."

    My other housemate Doug said Live At The Beacon wasn't as "saturated."  Indeed, within that recorded space, we could pick out each performer.  Since Doug was a film major, he had the vocabulary to describe film-making.  And that vocabulary helped him explain what we were hearing.  He said the sound was like "focusing" of a lens, or getting a higher-resolution camera.

    Okay, while we were listening to and talking about Live At The Beacon, I was deep into high-end audio.  Back at home, I had recently bought the Muse Model One Hundred power amp from Sounds Alive.  Now, while I was at Sounds /Alive, I clearly recall that the Model One Hundred was in a system with a Muse Model 18 subwoofer, some panel speakers (Martin Logans?), XLO cables, and a front end consisting of a Philips/Magnavox CD player and an Audio Alchemy DDE v1.0.  Sorry, I do not know what the preamp was.

    Did I want a one-box CD player?  No, with my NAD 5000 and Sony CDP-520ESII one-box players, I felt inadequate.  Did I want a CD changer?  No, I wanted a dedicated CD transport and separate outboard DAC.  Which CD transport did I lust after?  The Audio Alchemy DDS!  That thing was a 2-chassis affair.  It had cute little white/silver buttons.  It had a top lid with a slick gloss-black interior.  It had a disc clamp.  It had so many neat features, it was like a Broadway show or Live At The Beacon.

    With high-end audio brands running rampant in my head, I didn't give Adcom much thought.  I also didn't give source components' variable outputs (if they had 'em) much thought.  Audio reviewers told us that variable outputs were sonically inferior.

    Well, if you want to use the GCD-700's variable outputs, don't lose the remote!  The remote is the only means to control, among other functions, the variable outputs.  At the top of the variable outputs' range, voltage seems about equal to the fixed outputs (2.5V).

    Eh, the GCD-700's variable outputs are like, say, the volume control on a Walkman, Discman, or iPod.  If you have a decent preamp, using the fixed outputs will yield a more transparent sound.  Still, if you have no other sources, and just want to route the GCD-700 into a power amp or powered speakers, using the variable outputs is a good short cut.