Did the SUperclock 3 mod

kidloco

kidloco

kidloco

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Joined
3 Nov 2003
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Lancashire
After a couple of months of deciding wether to mod my CDP or buy a new CDP altogether I finnally took the plunge and bought a superclock 3 for my Marantz CD63 mk II KI SIG, retail is around £179 but they have a store on the bay where you can get it for £85. I got them to throw in all the nessacery extras (high quality wire, solder, sticky pads etc) for £2.

The thing arrived after a couple of days, unpacked it all and checked out the instructions. My plan was that if it was REALLY SIMPLE I would attempt it myself, or if it was PRETTY SIMPLE get my mate to do it.

After reading the instructions I decided I wasnt going near it or letting my mate near it. they were clear as mud.

I dropped it off Doug Bradeys hifi in warington, after a guy there called Andrew was reccomended to me. He seemed to really know his stuff and said it would only take about 40mins.

There were a few issues, I got a call off andy saying either they had sent the wrong part or the instructions are wrong and he cant fit it, I got in contact with Audiocom, got a number of a tech guy and got andy to call him, all was sorted in a few mins. seems the instructions are totall garbage.

When I got it home I opened up the player to see how he had fitted it. seems quite a tidy job, a hell of a lot bettert then I could have done.

cdplayertop.jpg


superclockfar.jpg


superclock.jpg


Got the CD player home last night, left it spinning a few discs for a couple of hours just to warm it up before I listened. Then I chucked in a really well recorded CD that I knew pretty well, The new Jack Johnson album.

I really couldnt believe the differance, it is like a new player, it was a good source before but it really has taken it onto another level of performance. Bass is so much tauter and snappier, the seperation of the instriments is amazing, they just hang in the air. and the twang on accoustic guitairs is just so much more life like. Aparently these superclocks take hundreds of hours to burn in and sound their best. I cant wait :)

I really cant reccomend this mod enough, all in it cost me around £120 for the superclock and to get it fitted, considering the differance it has made to the sound quality I think it more then justifies the price.

I am now going to stop my recent quest on upgrade frenzy and sit back and enjoy what I have, Its been a expensive few months. I have gone from


Marantz CD63 Mk II Ki Sig
Cyrus III amp
Mission 751 speakers on acatama stands
Qed Bronze speaker cable
Mark Grant Interconnects

to

Marantz CD63 Mk II Ki Sig with Superclock 3 mod
Roksan Kandy Mk III amp
B&W CDM1 speakers on Acatama stands
Chord Rumour 2 speaker cable
Mark Grant Intyerconnects


I have promised myself and the missus that the upgrading will stop for a bit, at least until I can afford to spend at least a grand on a nice set of floorstanders :D
 
Nice one!
I had my transport clocked last year, and like yourself was more than pleasantly surprised by the results. Just so much more natural.

Now go enjoy before you dream up better ways to spend your cash.
 
My stereo is hooked upto my PC via S/PDIF running MCE 2005. I noticed the sound was quite flat so after a bit of research discovered DFX, a Media Player add in. It has since raised the bar in audio quality for me, it transforms my tunes, the clarity is fantastic. I am sure it prob is very simular to this product, but without any hardware mods.

http://www.fxsound.com/dfx/index.php?vendor=0&subvendor=0&plus=0
 
thepharcyde said:
My stereo is hooked upto my PC via S/PDIF running MCE 2005. I noticed the sound was quite flat so after a bit of research discovered DFX, a Media Player add in. It has since raised the bar in audio quality for me, it transforms my tunes, the clarity is fantastic. I am sure it prob is very simular to this product, but without any hardware mods.

http://www.fxsound.com/dfx/index.php?vendor=0&subvendor=0&plus=0
Click to expand...

That product bears no resemblance at all to the clock hardware mod.

The software application "modifies" the sound. Effectively it's a graphic equaliser, which will almost certainly have the attendant issues of buggering up the signal along the way as it's mangling it.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that you don't prefer it's presentation, as you clearly do, but you're NOT improving the clarity of the signal, just modifying it in a way that you happen to like.

The clock reduces timing errors on transfer of digital data, resulting in the DAC receiving a more uniform input, thus reducing data errors being induced into the analogue signal. So it IS improving the signal by reducing error loss along the way.
 
Glad your enjoying the sound mate. But it gets even better when you add a separate PSU for the clock.


Still haven't got round to making a thread on modding the cd-63's 67's etc, but here's a pic of my lovely player atm. Just got the 2nd zero 7 album (finally) and it sounds divine:


imgp0896xu1eo8.jpg


superclock around bottom right, attached to it's dedicated Power supply (bottom left). Ive replaced loads of caps, and many other mods have also been done. Enjoy :D
 
LOL sorry but that was pretty funny :p

I was thinking of doing a stack more mods to the CD63 but Andrew at Doug Bradys kind of put me off.

He mentioned that the CD player was around 10 years old, and is sooner rather then later going to die :eek: and is it worth spending hundreds of pounds on mods.

He said that a new transport for the cd63 is around £120, plus you have to take into consideration that the caps etc are getting past the best days.

It gets to the stage were its like owning an old car, how much money do you keep chucking at it before you bite the bullet and get a new one

Dont get me wrong im sure it sounds fantastic but I have reached the financial limit I am prepared to throw at a 10 year old CD player. I will enjoy it till it goes bang, and then its going to cost me big time to replace it with some thing that sounds as nice.
 
kidloco said:
LOL sorry but that was pretty funny

I was thinking of doing a stack more mods to the CD63 but Andrew at Doug Bradys kind of put me off.

He mentioned that the CD player was around 10 years old, and is sooner rather then later going to die :eek: and is it worth spending hundreds of pounds on mods.

He said that a new transport for the cd63 is around £120, plus you have to take into consideration that the caps etc are getting past the best days.
Click to expand...

:eek: :eek: £12 for a new laser mechanism, and if the main trasport die's you can just buy any any old cd-63 (cheapy one), or even a dead one with a prefectly good transport and swap it in...... Disgusted at the £120, Tut Tut.

Also ive ive replaced all the important caps with brand new rubycon's, and jsut re-used some of the better quality caps (cerafines, silmics) from older players in less important locations.

It gets to the stage were its like owning an old car, how much money do you keep chucking at it before you bite the bullet and get a new one

Dont get me wrong im sure it sounds fantastic but I have reached the financial limit I am prepared to throw at a 10 year old CD player. I will enjoy it till it goes bang, and then its going to cost me big time to replace it with some thing that sounds as nice.
Click to expand...

Nah you could easily pick up another player for under £50. You will still have *** KI chassis to mount it in, and the only real difference will be the transformer. If your modifying it loads your replacing pretty much everything, so the KI isn't really needed.

anyway ENJOY it !
 
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