Marantz CD7300 CD-player
Big display - informative and well-to-read from a distance (truly this can't be concerned to its music calendar with little symbols) - takes all central part. The player displays not only time of playing and the number of a track but also the name of album and compositions if a disc is loaded from CD-Text. Here is the first difference in possibilities.
There are the buttons of direct access to tracks under the display - no one of the examinees had such simple but handy function. Moreover, fast transition on any track can be realized with a help of rotary handle which, by the way, is very handy for navigation through MP3 discs. Yeah, this is not a misprint - CD7300 plays this format too although there is no corresponding sign on the faceplate.
Take a glance to the remote control would be enough for getting a complete picture about the possibilities of this model. It has everything: functions of programming, and adjust of playback time, and navigations buttons though indexes, and search for minimal level and so on. Lineal analogue, digital coaxial and optical outputs can be used for connection CD7300 to the system. In addition there is a channel for stereo earphones with volume control.
Now few words about what CD7300 has inside. The mechanism VAM1202 approved itself perfectly in other models: silent, fast, and reliable. Not one bit Bitstream, being traditional for the previous models, but hybrid DAC CS4396 with delta/sigma conversion and built-in digital filter converts digit into analogue. The company "Cirrus-Logic" started to produce this chip aimed at the work with 24 bit stream and sampling frequency up to 192 kHz.
The firmed module HDAM finishes the sound channel. This is a shielded assembly, in which a set of discrete elements, providing increased dynamic and frequency characteristics, is used instead of microcircuits.
To be honest the test on playback of poor signals didn't impress. The sound is not pitted by typical digital "itch" and even isn't hidden by noises but just occurs to be unrecognizable: piano glazed over, bell sounded like big basin. Seemingly something went too far with filtration and digital processing.
How does it affect music? The track with clarinet recording gave the answer immediately. CD7300 coped with playback of its difficult spectral "comb" not bad, but high overtones and air components separated. The feeling that exactly the clarinet played was lost: the sound of air moving in the instrument's channel turned into certain formal hissing. The same effect appeared on flute in a less degree and less noticeable - on violins. It comes out, that the less high harmonics are in spectrum the more natural sound is. For example vocal is expressive and bass is like alive at all. It is interesting that high range is transferred realistically too. But it isn't on friendly terms with the middle.
Sound stage is deep and has natural scale, but here we also found the reason to grumble. The separation between grounds is not stable. Better to say sound sources of background in the stage are not fixed - sometimes they unceremoniously climb to the foreground. Also the illusion is created that space in the stage between imaginary sources is filled by some new echoes. The sounding on chamber or recorded in studio music turns out to be richer and more interesting but in all other cases the effect affects negatively - it prevents to feel features of hall acoustics, where the record was made, and the atmosphere of live concert.
