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Originally Posted by audioguy3107

Kind of a coincidence here, just yesterday, I was taking a look at a few classical labels that I really like, Hyperion and Channel Classics. Both offer downloads of high res 24/96 and 24/192 files on most of their releases. Anyway, I was curious just how close if not better their high rez downloads are compared to their CDs. I downloaded a 24/96 file of a Brahms string quartet and a 24/192 file of a new Stephen Hough Schubert piano disc, both from Hyperion. Loaded them onto a USB stick back into the Rossini. I compared the physical 16/44.1 CDs to the downloaded files. It was VERY VERY close, I spent about an hour listening and gathering some thoughts.....in the end the CD upsampled to DSD by the Rossini transport bettered the high rez files, but it was extremely close. I could hear slightly more texture, just a touch more realism from the discs. It's pretty hard to draw specific conclusions here since there are so many filters I could have tried, including upsampling to DXD. Anyway, point is, if I have the room and the disc costs the same as the files, I guess I might as well buy the discs I suppose.

- Buck

Interesting comparison Buck. I have a lot of DSD and hi-res pcm downloads from Channel and Hyperion, which sound very good to me, but have no disc player to make that kind of comparison. Almost makes me want to get a disc player...almost.