Pioneer 578

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

If any of you would like to have an inexpensive all-round machine in order
to dip your toes into DVD-A, SACD, or multichannel, I can recommend this
machine. I would rate it as follows:

CD - very, very good. Has the Pioneer "house sound" of slightly warm upper
bass and slightly rolled off deep bass, but very transparent in the midrange
and very dynamic. Excellent CD sound.

DVD-A - very good - not as transparent as the best, with exceptionally good
dynamics and an overall very listenable and reasonably transparent sound. A
little less "house sound", but still there.

SACD - acceptably good - converted to PCM and in the process looses a bit of
transparency...the ambience is drier than either of the above...same slight
"house sound" .. but to it's credit it "fixes" instruments in space with
stability that eludes my Sony C222ES.

DVD-V - excellent - after a few adjustments, pretty much a ringer from my
old Toshiba 4700, which up to now had the best video on my conventional tv
set. Far, far better than either the JVC 600 or the Panasonic S55 that
followed, as a DVD-V player. Excellent sound; nuanced picture.

All this for <$150. It's a minor miracle.

--
Harry Lavo
Retro Sound
Holyoke, MA 01040

"It don't mean a thing if it aint got that swing" - Duke Ellington

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

"Richard" <rstaples312@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:chli9q0rqi@news4.newsguy.com...
> "Harry Lavo" <harry.lavo@rcn.com> wrote:
>
> >If any of you would like to have an inexpensive all-round machine in
order
> >to dip your toes into DVD-A, SACD, or multichannel, I can recommend this
> >machine. I would rate it as follows:
> >
> >CD - very, very good. Has the Pioneer "house sound" of slightly warm
upper
> >bass and slightly rolled off deep bass, but very transparent in the
midrange
> >and very dynamic. Excellent CD sound.
> >
> >DVD-A - very good - not as transparent as the best, with exceptionally
good
> >dynamics and an overall very listenable and reasonably transparent sound.
A
> >little less "house sound", but still there.
> >
> >SACD - acceptably good - converted to PCM and in the process looses a bit
of
> >transparency...the ambience is drier than either of the above...same
slight
> >"house sound" .. but to it's credit it "fixes" instruments in space with
> >stability that eludes my Sony C222ES.
> >
> >DVD-V - excellent - after a few adjustments, pretty much a ringer from my
> >old Toshiba 4700, which up to now had the best video on my conventional
tv
> >set. Far, far better than either the JVC 600 or the Panasonic S55 that
> >followed, as a DVD-V player. Excellent sound; nuanced picture.
> >
> >All this for <$150. It's a minor miracle.
>
> A very good player Harry and worthy of recommendation. However, while
> this _is_ an audio group, you fail to mention the DVD video quality of
> this unit! I would suggest one look closely at the much higher rated
> Denon DVD-2200 in video mode 1. Top notch audio and MUCH better
> video! Yes, it is more costly at ~$599 so the Pioneer 578 is quite
> the bargain. However, I would suggest that if you are also looking
> for a DVD player that plays >= audio and much better videos than the
> Pioneer 578 and can afford to spend a bit more, look at the Denon
> DVD-2200 and get a B unit (factory refurbished) for a delivered price
> of ~$296.00. Both units have no layer change delay because the video
> is buffered. A BIG plus in my opinion! My Denon 2200 looks better to
> me than my brothers Lexicon RT-10 which is a $3,495.00 player! Of
> course the Lexicon has many controls that allow adjustment of video
> that other units do not have and the audio is quite excellent. The
> thing is, the Denon video looks better _without_ these extra controls!
> One might want to wait to see how the new units from Denon do in
> actual tests before purchasing. However, the Pioneer is available at
> an already good price and the Denon 2200 is being discontinued so you
> may be able to bargain for a better price.
>

You raise a good point. I would say, however, that while the video of the
578 is not very good out of the box (at least mine wasn't), it was easily
adjusted using the built in adjustment controls. After adjustment, it came
in very close to the Toshiba 4700, my previous standard for use with my
(conventional) tv. It was far better than the Panasonic S55 (fairly bad)
and JVC 600 (mediocre). My 20 yr old son is the "video expert" in our
household, and he concurs.

So the Pioneer may be better than you think, but certainly not out of the
box.

Archived from groups: rec.audio.high-end (More info?)

"Codifus" <codifus@optonline.net> wrote in message
news:cho54c02v62@news2.newsguy.com...
> Harry Lavo wrote:
>

>snip<

> How would you compare this new player to the DV 563 player that preceded
> it, especially in the SACD and CD formats?

Unfortunately, I never owned one (a 563) and therefore have no basis for
comparisons. Alex Peychev, a modifier that posts on AudioAsylum, has said
that it is cheaper in design...but whether or not that means it sounds worse
has not been established. If I interpret other conversations on that site,
the 563 may have tapped off the DSD stream separately, whereas the 578
converts it to 88khz pcm. Certainly, both the CD and DVD-A reproduction
seem to capture ambience a bit better than the SACD on the 578...so it
should not serve as primarily a SACD player. But as a backup, a second
system, or just to try out multichannel.....fine.

I *do* know that the 563 had control chip problems that led it to not being
able to read the SACD layer on many UMG hybrid disks...so a lot of people
who liked the sound gave them up because of the hassle. That is also why I
never even tried it.