Sony TA-E2000ESD AV preamplifier
Sony's new TA-E2000ESD is a second-generation successor to its TA-E1000ESD digital preamplifier. In size, appearance, panel controls, and general operating characteristics, the two are almost identical.
Like its predecessor, the TA-E2000ESD is a remarkably versatile stereo and video control center employing Sony's proprietary digital integrated circuits to process the audio signals on their way from its inputs to its output terminals. It can simulate a number of acoustic environments in a listening room, including two different concert halls, an opera house, a jazz club, a disco, a stadium, and two types of movie theaters. Ten of these acoustic environments are factory preset, and another ten can be programmed by the user and stored for recall at the touch of a button. The TA-E2000ESD also provides all-digital Dolby Pro Logic decoding for use with Dolby Surround movie soundtracks.
Despite its apparent similarity to its predecessor, the TA-E2000ESD offers a number of major improvements. The Dolby Pro Logic decoder employs digital circuitry for its signal-steering "logic" and its noise-reduction and delay functions. It can also be used in conjunction with any of the other nine factory-preset ambience modes. For example, a concert video encoded with Dolby Surround can be decoded in another mode, such as Stadium, to make the music performance more consistent with the visuals.
The built-in digital parametric equalizer can be used in conjunction with the Dolby circuitry to equalize the front, center, and surround channels, either independently or together. Sony points out that such equalization can be advantageous if you use a center speaker that's not identical to the left and right front speakers. The equalizer itself provides unique adjustment capabilities, with three bands and ninety-one selectable center frequencies. At any of those frequencies, the boost or attenuation is adjustable over a 12-dB range in 0.1-dB steps, with a choice of sixteen "Q" (bandwidth) values-a total of more than a million possible EQ settings. Sony claims that no perceptible noise, phase shift, or distortion is added by the digital circuitry. As in the earlier model, the EQ response is shown graphically in the display window (which is slightly larger in the new model).
A ten-step digital channel-separation control permits optimizing the separation for any room and speaker placement. Another control varies the dynamic range of the preamp's output, compressing or expanding the range as desired. Advanced Sony 1-bit digital-to-analog (D/A) converters and 32-bit digital processing are said to provide the highest possible linearity.
The TA-E2000ESD's operating parameters are set by several front-panel buttons and two knobs; the buttons select the parameter to be adjusted, and the knobs adjust the setting. Small red LED's on the panel identify the selected parameter, and the display window shows the setting during adjustment. A few seconds after an adjustment is made, the display changes to show only the information pertinent to the operation of the system-principally the program source, selected acoustic environment, and the equalized frequency response.
Although some of these adjustments are easily made with the front-panel controls (the knobs are especially convenient for this purpose), it is usually desirable to be at the listening location when changing parameters of the acoustic environments or setting the levels of the auxiliary speakers. The remote control furnished with the TA-E2000ESD duplicates all the essential front-panel controls, replacing the knobs with up/down pushbuttons. It also has sections labeled for controlling source components, including a CD player, laserdisc player, tuner, TV, and up to four VCR's. It can learn the commands for these components, and it comes preprogrammed for Sony components.
The TA-E2000ESD has analog inputs for phono, tuner, and CD, a digital-audio input with both coaxial and optical connectors, and a set of optical digital recording and playback connectors. Signals entering at the analog inputs pass through the preamp's internal oversampling analog-to-digital (A/D) converters before being processed, while incoming digital signals go directly to the digital signal processing (DSP) circuits. Before the output stage, D/A converters translate the processed signals back to analog form.
Other analog audio inputs are designated for TV, laserdisc, and auxiliary video sources and for four VCR's. S-video input and output connectors are also provided for two of the VCR's, and there are two composite-video outputs and one S-video output for video monitors. One set of VCR inputs (video 5), including audio, composite video, and S-video, is intended for use with a camcorder and is located on the front panel, behind a hinged section concealing some less frequently used controls.
All input/output connectors except those for video 5 and the front-panel headphone jack are on the rear apron. These include tape-recording in/out jacks for the various video sources, outputs for the video monitors, and the usual audio tape recording and playback jacks.
The rear apron carries separate line-level audio outputs for the front, center, and rear (surround) channels and two subwoofer outputs with an 80-Hz cutoff at 18 dB per octave. Three of the four AC outlets are switched, and the total capacity is 720 watts.
The TA-E2000ESD is a handsome component equipped with woodgrain side plates that can be removed to reduce its width to a conventional 17 inches. The interior of the black metal cabinet is densely packed with circuit boards, and the unit weighs a solid 18-3/4 pounds.
This is such a complex component, with so many combinations of operating parameters, that it would be impossible (and unnecessary) to measure and verify all of its performance qualities, or even a significant fraction. Our measurements were necessarily limited to verifying the characteristics of the most commonly used features in its basic role as a control amplifier in an audio/video system. Even such a straightforward matter as measuring its input sensitivity for a standard 0.5-volt output was complicated by the presence of a small input-level control (behind the front-panel door). The control's setting has a major effect on sensitivity and overload characteristics. We set it so that the analog output of a CD player could not overload the A/D converters (as indicated by a front-panel LED) and left it there for most subsequent measurement and listening tests. Otherwise, we tried to adhere to EIA measurement standards for audio preamplifiers.
We made some measurements, such as frequency response and distortion, using both analog and digital sources. The most convenient digital source was a CD player's digital output. Accordingly, we fed the digital output of a Denon DCD-1500II player through its optical output and a fiber-optic cable to the optical digital input of the Sony preamp, effectively replacing the CD player's D/A converters with those of the TA-E2000ESD.
The TA-E2000ESD has a Source Direct button that bypasses its parametric-equalizer, dynamic-range, and surround (Pro Logic) circuitry. It also disconnects the rear- and center-channel outputs, leaving only the main front and subwoofer outputs active. We measured the frequency response with this feature active and with it disengaged. The difference was insignificant (less than 0.2 dB at 20,000 Hz)-response was extremely flat at either setting and through any input. The subwoofer-output response was flat within 5 dB from 10 to 70 Hz, falling 3 dB from 70 to 85 Hz and 10 dB at 100 Hz.
We plotted the frequency response of the parametric equalizer at a single frequency, 1,000 Hz. Its maximum boost or cut was exactly as rated, and the Q of the response curve was adjustable between values of 0.5 and 20. With the lowest value, the boost affected almost the full audio range, from 100 to 10,000 Hz, but with the highest Q setting it modified the response only between 800 and 1,200 Hz. Since the center frequency of the boost or cut, as well as its magnitude and Q, are adjustable over wide ranges, and three independent corrections may be applied, this feature offers limitless possibilities for correcting system or recording response deficiencies-provided that you have equally limitless patience.
For our listening evaluation, we set up the Sony TA-E2000ESD in a four-channel surround system (main and surround speakers) and used both CD's and FM as sources. The fifty-five-page instruction manual, quite complete and comprehensive, is laid out in logical blocks according to function, but it was not always easy to locate the specific information we needed. For example, we were frustrated in trying to measure the frequency response of the subwoofer outputs because the legend "subwoofer off" appeared in the display. We searched for a way to activate these outputs from the front panel. Finally, we found a reference in the manual (in the section dealing with the display panel) to a button on the remote control that is the only means of controlling this function.
During our listening we used as many features as were applicable. The results were excellent, with a very natural sense of ambience being generated in our 15 x 20-foot room using the Hall modes. The ambience was more suggestive of a live concert than in most of our previous experience with similar devices.
The dynamic-range adjustment offers compression or expansion with a single knob. Subjectively, the effect was surprisingly subtle, but with practice it is easy to hear the contribution of the circuit and set it as desired.
Inevitably, we have to compare the Sony TA-E2000ESD to its predecessor, the TA-E1000ESD. When we tested the earlier model, we did not have a final instruction manual and had to feel our way through a totally unfamiliar and very complex product. This time we were dealing with a fully engineered product that has clearly benefited from technological improvements over the past three years, and it was supplied with a very thorough manual.
Functionally, the TA-E2000ESD is virtually identical to its predecessor, although many of the functions formerly handled by analog circuits are now done digitally. The difference was not necessarily apparent from ordinary listening or use tests, especially since the control functions are virtually identical.
Our measurements clearly showed the superiority of Sony's new D/A converters-they had the best low-level linearity (down to -100 dB) that we have yet measured. The phono section of the new preamplifier was markedly better than that of the earlier model, with improved headroom and outstanding equalization accuracy.
All in all, Sony has taken an already uniquely versatile and refined component and made it even better. When we tested the TA-E1000ESD three years ago, we found it hard to imagine how it could be significantly improved. It has been, however, and at a modest increase in price that is easily justified in a product of this degree of refinement.
One price to be paid for owning a component as sophisticated as this one is the time it takes to study the instruction manual (not merely skim its pages). The TA-E2000ESD offers an enormous variety and range of adjustments, and their effects will not always be obvious. You'll need a lot of hands-on experience to reap all the benefits of Sony's design efforts, but the effort will be thoroughly justified.
The Sony TA-E2000ESD is one of the most refined audio/video/surround-sound control centers we have seen. Like many such products, its complexity can seem overwhelming. Just remember that you do not have to adjust every parameter that can be adjusted! In many, perhaps most, cases there will be little or no audible difference from changes in such things as the listening-seat position in the concert hall or the shape of the hall. Use this component for what it can do for your listening experience, and you will swiftly become addicted to it.
