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Arcam rDac and Rega DAC review against £500 CD Player - 07.06.11

Components used
Rega Brio Amplifier, Rega Apollo CD, KEF Q100’s, Atacama HMS2 Stands filled with Atabites, Chord Cobra Interconnect with VEE Plugs fitted, Chord Rumour 4 BiWire Speaker Cable, Chord ProDac, Chord Optichord, Rega DAC, Arcam rDAC, Hi-Fi Racks Podium Reference Shelves.

Tracks used for audition
‘Space and Time’ The Verve from ' from the ‘Urban Hymns’ CD.
‘Your Love Is King’ Sade from the Remastered 'Diamond Life' CD.
‘The Man Who Sold The World’ Nirvana from the ‘Unplugged In New York’ CD.

Objective
To report on the sonic differences when adding the Arcam rDac and Rega DAC (independently) to a £500 CD Player. We will compare the performance of both DAC’s against the CD Players’ own analogue output. We used the Hi-Fi Racks Podium Reference Stand, Atacama HMS2 stands filled with Atabites, Chord Rumour 4 BiWire Speaker Cable and Chord Cobra Plus cables throughout the test.

The Test
For our first audition we used the Rega Brio and Apollo combination stood on the Hi-Fi Racks Podium Reference stand connected to the KEF Q100’s with the Arcam rDac and Rega DAC occupying the lower shelf.
We started the test listening to Sade’s ‘Your Love Is King’ with the rDac connected to the digital output of the Apollo CD using the Chord ProDac Coax Digital Cable. We found the vocals a little strained and when we moved on to the The Verve’s ‘Space and Time’, complex passages had a tendancy to lose focus. Changing the digital input of the rDac to Optical input using Chord’s Optichord provided a slight improvement in the weight of the sound. Plugging the Chord Cobra Plus cables direct from the output sockets of the Rega Apollo CD Player improved Sade’s vocals and the overall presentation regained body and delicacy.
Next we connected the Rega DAC to the system using the ProDac cable and there was an immediate improvement with a more ‘three dimensional’ sound stage with our chosen pieces of music – a clear improvement over the Apollo’s own efforts. Using the Optical connection of the Rega DAC made a slight improvement compared to the Coaxial connection, producing the same character of sound but with better articulation.

Our Summary
The Arcam rDac clearly has a place in the market but at £300 is not going to bring benefits to a £500+ CD Player. It will however be a good choice for streaming audio from a computer by making use of the rDac’s USB input. Budget priced CD Players will benefit from the addition of the rDac in our opinion.
The Rega DAC certainly brings out more expression and presence in the tracks we used for this review and a clear improvement on the Apollo CD Player’s own analogue output.
One last note, the KEF Q100 loudspeakers clearly preferred the bi-wire option when compared to single wiring with this system. We noticed an improvement in high frequency detailing in bi-wire mode compared to the single wire option using Chord Rumour 4. A worthy improvement with this system.