Best Sonos ZP-80 Mod?

Tboooe - I have confirmation that the Cullen mod does NOT effect the software. I runs the same.

-G

Thank you Janikian!

All: I too purchased my Sonos purely because of its convenience. I have zone players in every bedroom (4), the family room, the backyard, the balcony, and my listening room. For every room other than my listening room I agree with Marty that convenience outweighs quality. But for my listening room, I am willing to go through a little more hassle to have great sound, which in this case simply means having to keep my preamp remote close to me, which I dont find to be a problem at all. I do keep a stash of my favorite cds around so I can pop it into my Esoteric cdp when I want the listen critically. But I guess I just want it all...I want the rest of cd collection (5K cds) to sound good through the Sonos too!

Marty,

The digital output is variable. The volume control affedts all the outputs. You can check this in the Sonos website forums. One tread claims that this does not degrades sound quality unless you reduce the volume more than, I think, 48dB.

It's great that you are happy with all your ZP100s. My only point is that you can significantly increase the quality without loosing convenience by using a ZP80 feeding an amplifier. In my experience, the quality jump going form ZP100 to ZP80+amplifier is significantly larger than going form ZP80+amplifier to ZP80+DAC+Pre+Amp. BTW, I also have different horses for different courses :-)

5 years or less from now, transports will be will be considered as impratical as turntables - but not as revered of course.

Computor audio will surpass the best transport before then, and what we are seeing in this thread I believe is the genesis of that.

That said I am desperately looking for something to replace my $5000 transport - but the technology is not quite there I fear.

Meanwhile who can guide me on choosing between the Cullen and Empiracle mods?

Acastano

I guess I was misinformed! 2 years ago, when my house was being built, I put this question to the tech folks at Sonos for exactly this reason. I was putting Cat5 throughout and was considering the possibility of a wired Sonos system. The company assured me that the digital out was fixed level. Either that's changed or they screwed up.

On the one hand, that is a very significant fact. Slipping a modestly priced reclocking DAC between the ZP-80 and my Pathos/Cremona system might make some sense. However, I still can't see going the supply mod/pace car/DAC route. As to potential improvement - your point is taken. As to the cost/benefit, I'm still not so sure,

Marty