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EQUIPMENT PROFILE
MAGNAVOX
FD1000SL
COMPACT
DISC PLAYER
Manufacturer's Specifications
Frequency Response: 20 Hz to 20
kHz, ±0.3 dB.
Dynamic Range: Greater than 90
dB.
S/N Ratio: Greater than 90 dB (20 Hz
to 20 kHz).
Channel Separation: 86 dB (20 Hz
to 20 kHz); 90 dB at 1
kHz.
Total Harmonic Distortion Plus
Noise: Less than 0.005%.
Wow and Flutter: Unmeasurable,
quartz crystal precision.
Line Output Level: 2 V rms.
Power Consumption: 20 watts.
Dimensions: 12.6 in. (32 cm) W x
2.87 in. (7.3 cm) H x 10.51 in. (26.7
cm) D.
Weight: 11 lbs. (5 kg).
Price: $800.00.
Company Address: c/o NAP Con-
sumer Electronics Corp., P.O. Box
6950, Knoxville, Tenn.
For literature, circle No. 92
Billed as the smallest Compact Disc player in the world,
this attractively styled unit is also the lowest priced of three
models to be offered by Magnavox. Magnavox, as
probably know, is a wholly owned subsidiary of North Ameri-
can Philips. And North American Philips, in turn, is owned
by Philips of Holland, to whom must go the primary credit for
the development of the CD format, which has already be-
come an international standard. Although credit for the disc
and player is generally shared by Philips and Sony, the truth
86
is that Sony's primary contribution was in the area of the
error -correction systems that were ultimately adopted.
you
was Philips which began work on the digital disc idea way
back in 1969 and 10 years later showed the first working
system to the European press.
The unit I tested, in fact, bore the model number CD -100,
suggesting that it was actually a sample of the Philips model
being sold in Europe, with its power supply modified for use
in the U.S. We are told, however, that the configuration and
AUDIO/JUNE 1983
It
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all of the features of this model are otherwise identical to the
Magnavox FD1000SL, which will be the American designa-
tion for this truly compact Compact Disc player.
Magnavox maintains there are subtle differences in the
quality of sound reproduction between various manufactur-
ers' CD players, and they attribute this to technical differences in the way the players reproduce sound. The main
difference is in the signal -conversion process from digital
back to analog. All of the units I have tested to date (with the
exception of the Phase Linear Model 9500) use straight 16 -
bit D/A converters with steep analog filters. Some listeners
maintain that the use of a sharp cutoff filter results in consid-
erable phase shift in the 20 -kHz region; they perceive this
as detrimental to proper stereo imaging and reproduction of
transients.
The Magnavox player incorporates three techniques that
are said to provide the effectiveness of a pure 16-b t sys-
tem, but which require a simpler digital -to -analog converter
with simpler filters. First, "oversampling" is used. Th s has
the effect of reducing noise in the audio band by an addi-
tional 6 dB. The technique involves sampling the digital
signal at four times the normal rate, thereby distributing the
noise over a broader spectrum. Secondly, digital filtering is
used to remove ultrasonic components while maintaining
phase linearity up to 20 kHz. Finally, noise shaping is used
to reduce noise in the audio band by an additional 7 dB
while increasing noise outside the audio band. The unwant-
ed high -frequency noise is then eliminated with simple ana-
log filters.
Unlike any of the CD players I have previously tested, the
FD1000SL is a top -loading unit. Depressing a designated
area on the see-through hinged door on the player's top
surface causes that door to pop open. The Compac: Disc is
simply placed on the exposed center spindle, and the door
is closed manually. All remaining controls and displays are
on the gently sloping front surface. A power on -off pushbut-
ton is at the extreme left. A display area labelled "Track
Program Selector" occupies the same left -to -right length of
the sloped surface as does the disc -loading door on the top
surface, making for an extremely pleasing and integrated
look. When power is first applied, a bank of green LEDs,
numbered from 1
the right of the display area is then depressed, disc playing
to 15, illuminates.
If the "Play" button to
will commence from the first track and an additional row of
LEDs below the "program" LED bank will display the current
track being played. "Pause" and "Stop" buttons are located
alongside the "Play" touch button. An additional LED lights
up in the display area when the "Pause" button is activated.
Touching the "Pause" button a second time causes ,play to
resume and extinguishes the "Pause" LED.
In addition to this straightforward approach to the playing
of Compact Discs, the FD1000SL offers several otl-er op-
tions, including programming of desired selections on a
disc in any given order. Four tiny touch buttons furthe to the
right are identified as "Select," "Store," "Cancel" and "Re-
peat." Pressing the "Repeat" button causes the entire disc
to be played over and over again until the button is de-
pressed a second time or until "Stop" is depressed. While in
the repeat mode, another LED in the display area lights up
to indicate that fact. The three remaining buttons in this area
Booklet, demo disc and
cleaning cloth packed with the player.
provide the user with two different methods of program-
ming. The "Select" button, when depressed, moves the
"track" LED in the display, one track at a time, to any
desired track from 1 to 15. When the desired track you want
to hear first is indicated, touching the "Store" button places
that track number in "memory." By repeating this sequence
of operations, a method referred to in the owner's manual as
"Add -In Programming," you can program in as many tracks
as you like, in any order you choose.
An alternate method of programming, called "Take -Out
Programming," is used if you want to hear most, but not all,
of the selections contained on a particular disc. In that case,
the "Select" button is used to bring the moving LED to the
track that you don't want to near, and the "Cancel" button is
then touched. Upon completing this routine, the appropriate
LED in the upper bank of "Track Program Selector" LEDs is
extinguished, indicating that that particular track will be
skipped when it is reached. The procedure is repeated until
all undesired tracks have been selected. If the "Play" button
is then depressed, disc play will commence and will pro-
ceed in order, from track to track, skipping only those tracks
that you have "cancelled."
The remaining two touch buttons on the sloped front
panel are "Search" buttons that are used to advance the
laser rapidly in either forward or reverse direction. Although
there is no sound heard when using the "Search" buttons,
the current track being scanned at any instant by the laser
pickup is indicated by an appropriate LED in the display. If
you should inadvertently hold down a forward or reverse
search button so that the laser reaches the end (or the
beginning) of the disc, an "Error" light will come on.
In this Magnavox player, the emphasis is clearly on purity
of sound reproduction and ease of programmability. Certain
features I have encountered on other CD players have been
omitted, however. For example, no time indications are
provided either as to time remaining on a disc or time into a
given track being played. No doubt some of Magnavox's
more expensive models to be offered
incorporate additional features.
in the future will
AUDIO/JUNE 1983
87
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"In this Magnavox player,
the emphasis is clearly
on
purity of sound
reproduction and ease of
programmability."
-BO
- 90
- I0
-20
- 30
0
40
50
60
70
SEPARATION, R TO L
SEPARATION, L TO R
20
100
FREQUENCY- Hz
RESPONSE
10k
Fig. 1-Frequency
response and stereo
separation.
I k
111111111111
10k 20k
0.010
11111111111
0.009
11111111111111
0008
111111111111=M111.11111111111111111fl
0.007
IMMIIIIIIIIIM11111111111111111Mu
0.006
0005
111111111111MMIIMMIIIIII
111111111111mmiisammislill
0.004
0.003
0002
0.001
11111111111
20
100
M1111111111.1111a11111
=111111111111111111111111111
Iliplimm111111i
111111n11111111111111111
=REGLIENCY- Hz
Fig. 2-Harmonic
distortion vs. frequency.
Measurements
A point -by -point plot of frequency response (upper curve)
and channel separation capability
for the Magnavox
FD1000SL is shown in Fig. 1. Maximum departure from flat
response in the range covered by the test disc (100 Hz to 20
kHz) was never greater than 0.2 dB, and even that deviation
was noted only for the 18- and 20 -kHz test signals. Separa-
tion, represented by the lower curves in Fig. 1, ranged from
83 to 87 dB for left -to -right channel crosstalk and from 86 to
87 dB for right -to -left channel crosstalk.
Harmonic distortion versus frequency at 0 dB is shown in
Fig. 2; readings ranged from 0.002% to 0.004%. At the -10
dB level of the 1 -kHz test tone on the disc, THD rose to a still
completely insignificant 0.0085%. At -20 dB level, THD
increased somewhat further to 0.023%.
Decreasing -amplitude 1 -kHz test tones were also used to
check linearity of the playback system. Absolutely perfect
linearity was noted from 0 dB level all the way down to -60
dB. At -80 dB, linearity seemed to be off by 1.0 dB, and at
- 90 dB I read an output of - 88 dB, which may well have
been residual noise in my test setup rather than actual
departure from true signal linearity.
Signal-to-noise ratio measured 92.5 dB, unweighted, in-
creasing to 99.5 dB when an A -weighting filter was inserted
in series with the measuring instrument. At 0 dB recording
level, SMPTE IM measured 0.0056%, increasing to 0.013%
at -10 dB level. Measurements for CCIF (twin tone) IM
were 0.0010% and 0.0025% at 0 and -10 dB record levels,
respectively. De -emphasis was accurate to within 0.1 dB at
the three test frequencies of 1, 5, and 10 kHz included in the
test disc.
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Use and Listening Tests
Happily, my collection of CD records is growing by leaps
and bounds. I now own more than a dozen of these amazing
little discs, and I am pleased to report they are getting better
and better, musically speaking. Someone out there must be
listening to those of us who have suggested that new mixing
techniques and approaches (or are they really "old tech-
niques" after all?) are going to be needed if the Compact
Disc's potential is to be realized. Two recent acquisitions
are from RealTime Records (Miller & Kreisel Sound Corp.).
One is from their "Digital Masterpiece Series," Zoltan Rozs-
nyai conducting The Philharmonica Hungarica in selections
by Brahms, Berloz, Chabrier, Rossini, Bizet, Dvorak, Dukas
and Liszt. The other, Real Hot Jazz, features jazz -band mu-
sic by the likes of Don Menza, Jack Sheldon, John Dentz
and Freddie Hubbard and their assorted musical aggrega-
tions.
If you want to know how totally thrilling digital disc
reproduction can be, drop either of these (depending upon
your musical taste) into any CD player and you'll be an
immediate convert.
Could I hear a "difference" between the sound produced
by the Magnavox unit and my own reference CD player?
Frankly, no! The new discs sounded absolutely superb
both. This is not to say that you won't be able to detect
subtle differences if you listen long enough. All I'm saying is
the CD experience is so overwhelming compared to
analog listening I've done over the years, that straining to
pick out hitherto undetectable flaws seems a pointless
cise to me.
I
prefer to enjoy the music-as I've never
enjoyed it before-and to thank the people at Philips (and,
yes, those at Sony, too) for bringing this miracle to us during
our lifetimes.
This much I
will say: The earliest CDs in my collection,
and those that were produced from less -than -excellent
log master tapes, point up their failings on any type of CD
player, while the most recent Compact Discs sound good
on both the Magnavox and my reference player. In that
connection, the Philips unit I received for testing was mag-
nificently packaged. Included with it was a Philips Compact
Disc containing 14 cuts, eight of them pop music, the rest in
the classical domain. This disc, too, offered a superb'example of how CDs should be engineered. Magnavox would be
wise to offer their version of the player packaged just as it
was by Philips, including this magnificent sampler. As for
the Magnavox CD player, its small size, excellent design in
terms of ergonomic factors and its relatively low price make
it a sure winner.
Leonard Feldman
on
some
any
exer-
ana-
88
AUDIO/JUNE 1983
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