CD Player/Transport Reviews

The $800 JVC XL-Z1050TN 1050 is the Bitstream successor to JVC's popular 18-bit XL-Z1010, which got an enthusiastic thumbs-up from Robert Harley in April 1990 (Vol.13 No.4). Its styling is, in my opinion, much improved over the older player's, with the distinctive brushed-bronze finish of the rest of JVC's XL-Z line. The rear panel sports fixed and variable outputs (footnote 1), as well as Toslink optical and coaxial digital outputs. As with the 1010, the JVC features their proprietary K2 Interface, a circuit that reduces jitter by resampling the pulses with a short-duration gate just ahead of the single-bit JVC JCE-4501 DAC chip.

Internally, the 1050 looks impressive, with a much beefier power supply than most mass-market CD players I've examined; the power supply is supposedly one of the improvements made to the 1050 over the older 1010. The aforementioned K2 Interface circuit is enclosed in a shielded mini-enclosure, to guard against both electrical interference and prying reviewers. The analog stage features the same blue-blob film caps I keep seeing in all the Japanese players, including the Sony and Denon, and the ubiquitous 5532 op-amps, one chip for each channel. The outputs are AC-coupled with extremely large-sized 47µF/50V electrolytic caps.

Sound Quality
"The JVC gets the midrange right"; that was my first thought when I heard it, and it's still the player's most salient characteristic. Vocals seem to hang in midair with the 1050, which in this area almost rivals the Theta DS Pro Basic. Where the Theta edges the JVC is that last dollop of 3-D dimensionality it's become so lauded for, but the JVC offers a very similar midrange presentation, one that's totally unexpected from a mass-market Japanese CD player. With certain CDs like the amazing-sounding new Kenny Rankin Because Of You (Chesky JD63, footnote 2), the vocals are very nearly as finely rendered, as grainless, and as spatially distinct as the Theta, which is extraordinary performance for the money.

Low-level detail, too, is a strong point with the 1050, which almost seems to swagger, "Ya want fractals? I'll give you fractals!" In what seems to be a trend for me and Stevie Ray Vaughan CDs, I caught a bit of extremely low off-mike vocal scatting at 2:11 into the jazzy instrumental take of Kenny Burrell's "Chitlins Con Carne" that I hadn't noticed before with several of the other players reviewed here.

Another example of the 1050's clean low-level behavior was the track "My Romance" on New York Reunion; I was listening to it one day when suddenly I thought I heard my name being called from outside my house. "It's those guys that beat the crap out of Dan Rather!" I gasped, maybe a little paranoid after watching David Duke stomp Buddy Roemer in Louisiana's gubernatorial primary (footnote 3). But no, there it was at exactly ten seconds into the track; either the piano's pedal is squeaking "oh-ee," or David Chesky's trying to wrest control of my mind. This kind of hyper-detail is a trick at any price, much less the JVC's $800 retail tag.

Where does the dream end? The deepest bass doesn't have that balls-to-the-wall slam of the Theta, or even of the otherwise unremarkable Denon DCD-2560. It's fairly clean, but you don't get the ultimate extension and control of the more expensive processor. Even so, the JVC never failed to get my mojo working on material like The Commitments soundtrack, or especially disc 7 of the Stax/Volt box set, with its heaven-sent chronological medley of Otis & Carla's "Tramp," "Soul Finger" and "Knucklehead" by the Bar-Kays, Otis again on "Shake," Albert King's "Born Under A Bad Sign," and finally Sam & Dave's "Soothe Me." Unbelievable, heroic ART that makes a bunch of GIANT UMBRELLAS STUCK IN THE GROUND seem infinitely pointless by comparison (footnote 4).

How does the JVC do it? The same way most inexpensive gear that aspires to high-end performance does it: by sinning mostly by omission. Where the JVC does this is at the frequency extremes; the bass isn't the deepest or strongest, and the high end is slightly rolled-off and forgiving. Not sweet, just forgiving. By avoiding the typical astringency in the high end of most players in this price range, the 1050 draws you into the presentation, where the clear-as-a-bell midrange and above-average depth/staging deliver the knockout punch.

Whether you can pin it on JVC's proprietary K2 anti-jitter circuit or the enhanced power supply, the 1050 takes the same 5532s, electrolytic coupling caps, and mid-grade resistors as the Sony CDP-X555ES and Denon DCD-2560 players, and delivers a sound that's on a whole other level entirely. In fact, I preferred the sound of the 1050 to the similarly priced Audio Alchemy DDE/Rotel 855 combo, which I found to be more forward and slightly harder-sounding through the mids and highs. Add in the fact that the JVC player was also the best-sounding transport of the players reviewed in this issue that had coax outputs, and the 1050 looks like a winner.

Summing Up
For $800, I'm not sure you can do much better than the JVC XL-Z1050; it offers a musical sound, good looks, and can serve double-duty as a really fine transport if you decide to buy a separate processor down the road. Chris—this one's got your name on it.

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Footnote 1: Ignore these; as with every other player I've tried that had them, the variable outputs sound significantly worse than the fixed pair. C'MON! Get off that fat ass and change the volume atcher preamp, soldier!

Footnote 2: One of the highlights of my trip to this past AES convention in New York was spending some time with Chesky's Bob Katz in his listening-room/design-lair, listening to some of his latest work. In my opinion, Bob is one of the most talented recording enginears today, and the tracks that we heard were, to a one, uncanny. The Rankin CD may be the Bobkat's best-sounding release to date, even if the music is a wee-bit white-bread for my unwashed palette (although the bass-vocal duet on Monk's "Round Midnight" is killer!).

Footnote 3: Am I the only one who thought former Klanmate Tom Metzger's comment about Duke's KKK tenure in the November 18th Newsweek—"His flagrant womanizing was an embarrassment to the movement"—was the funniest thing ever in that magazine?

Footnote 4: Albert King never got uprooted by the wind and smushed some poor lady. I rest my case.