What does Jitter sound like?

Dgarretson - Wow and flutter exhibit the same results as jitter, frequency modulation, so the answer is yes, although some jitter occurs at rates and changes in ways that a turntable could not physically do.

Steve N.

"My point was that there is no jitter added or lost by copying CD-R's many times (provided everything remains in the digital domain). The same is true for digital processing - it adds no jitter. ONLY a jittery clock or jittery signal makes jitter."

I agree with all of this. However, inaccuracies in the pit locations on the CD or CD-R contribute to the PLL clock jitter in the CD player. This has been demonstrated thousands of times. There were even several products that re-wrote CD's to get improved pit placement. They work with every CD player I have tried.

Steve N.

Brownsfan - As I have said in other posts, it is the PRIMARY deficiency that makes Digital Audio fatigueing, and is the single most significant flaw in the S/PDIF and CD format.

Steve N.

However, inaccuracies in the pit locations on the CD or CD-R contribute to the PLL clock jitter in the CD player

There is no PLL (Phase Lock Loop) used in a CD player unless it is getting its timing daisy chained down from some external device rather than its own internal clock (say an external SPDIF signal or TosLink signal, however this is not thee usual setup as youu are just using the CD players DAC).

Phase Lock Loops are used between devices in order to maintain synchronization ( for example a CD player and a DSP - the PLL in the DSP will keep in sync with the bit stream from the CD player - some PLL implementations can do a good job of reducing jitter )

Please refer to Page 207 of Nika Aldrich's book "Digital Audio Explained for the Audio Engineer" for an explanatin of a Phase Locked Loop (PLL). I strongly recommend this book to people unfamiliar with digital electronics (you don't need to be an EE to follow it).

The reason I mention comparison between speed fluctuations in TT & digital jitter in CDP is because I experience these phenomena quite differently. As the speed stability of my TT has improved through various upgrades, I hear improved dimensionality, soundstage, bass control, dynamics, liveliness, focus, etc., even though pitch remains audibly imperfect. On this narrow point of pitch stability the CDP surpasses and I suspect will always surpass the TT (as evidenced particularly with piano music.) But somehow the ear is forgiving of even quite audible fluctuations in timing that originate in the analog domain. Perhaps this is because the physical locus of the stylus ensures that timing variations are applied uniformly across all spectra at each point in the LP groove.

In contrast, digital jitter seems to smear timing quite differently and more objectionably so. Having progressed through four generations of clock in my CDP I can say that most of what listeners think is synthetic & irritating about RBCD relates to jitter.