Jolida JD 100 versus Arcam CD 73 or CD 192 Comparisons

[rsp1068]

Hi All,<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

I asked this question in my other thread but it was kind of buried...

Has anyone done an A/B comparison between the Jolida JD 100 and either the Arcam CD 73 or CD 192? If you have, please advise your impressions of the characteristics and differences.

Yes, I owned both at the same time.

With an ss pre amp the Jolida is hard to beat. It does a beautiful job at taking the digital edge out of the discs, and adding a little realistic weight to notes.

With a tubed pre, and power amp, I kept the Arcam. The Jolida was a little bloated through all tubes, and the finer details became lost through the chain.

The arcam is now in use with my all tube set up, and it extracts everything from the disc accurately into RF 7's.

I also used a Bel Canto dac2 with the Jolida, but it was a tad laid back in comparrison to the Jolida, which may have just been a gain issue as much as anything.

My simple take on it all, Jolida is hard to beat at price point with ss down stream, and the Arcam with all tubes down stream.

I'm still saving for the Meridian or Wadia.

[rsp1068]

Arcam with tubes.

[3dzapper]

This thread is "very interesting". Keep it going, I hope to get another CDP sometime this year myself. The Regas intrigue me.

[EL34]

Hi Audio Flynn,

The Njoe Tjoeb is an older model Marantz CD player that is modified to add a tube output stage. So if you know what budget Marantz stuff looks like, then you know why it seems "less robust". In fairness the transport tray really plays no part in the sound of a well designed unit. I have never liked marantz gear sort of their very top end stuff and could never justify paying for that.

Hi Carl,

I am an authorised Jolida dealer and have been for ten years. I don't sell any modified gear but I can do modifications when needed. I don't believe that there is any merit in modifying CD players and really don't even like to modify their amps. The reason is that there are so many choices of CD players available that it is wasteful to pick one that is not performing to your satisfaction and then proceed to "invest" more money into it; I just recommend other models that meet the customer's needs. As far as the amp mods go, I typically only do really useful mods such as adding sub outs. The guys that have their own "my Jolida is better than yours" mods are just trying to pull customers away from other dealers and even squeeze a few more dollars out of them. Jolida can't warranty something that they haven't done. I have even seen some of these "mods" that don't do ANYTHING electrically, but rather just add different feet, etc to dampen the units. That would not void the warranty but I wouldn't want to pay for it either. The trouble there is that the Jolida gear was never designed to be a high end pproduct but a great value. These "mods" rob the units of that value - yuk.

The Jolida JD100 player is their third generation CD player. I have been around to see the very first introduced and have of course tried out and sold each version. Their initial attempt at a tube based player was much like the Njoe Tjoeb in that they took an existing, budget player and modified it. It was a disaster as it was very unreliable. It sounded great! Really, it was one of the sweetest sounding tubed CD players that I have heard. It wasn't the most resolving or particularly neutral sounding unit but it had a HUGE soundstage. I mean amazing! The trouble was that it would skip if you tapped it or tilted it, etc and ultimately they all just stopped reading discs.

The second generation player was much better in terms of reliability and was also a modified player but still had a cheap, plasticky feel to it. It lost the warmth and depth of the first player but gained resolution. It felt like and sounded the most like the Njoe Tjoeb to me. It maybe wasn't as well built as that even but it was very affordable and really didn't float my boat overall.

The JD100 was the result of that learning curve. They just could not make a player of the quality that they wanted by modifying other products. With the JD100, they stamped their own heavy steel chassis and built it from the ground up. It is built like a tank and if you have ever lifted one, you know what I am talking about. The inside is very clean and well laid out and the output stage is a real tube output stage, not just a tube buffer like some other units. It also uses what may be the most common tube in the world in the 12AX7, so no funky stuff there. I like the player alright but they had to double the price of the unit to make it into its final version here at almost $1000. That puts it up there with some pretty stiff competition and no matter how I like the robust build quality and the smooth sound of it, I can always find another player that has better sonic traits. It is also a little on the warm and fuzzy side for me sonically and I like a very natural sounding front end. Many of my customers really like it and we just one yesterday actually. No one that bought one has ever claimed that I twisted their arm!

-Bill