Goldmund Transport for the poor

What a challenge - for Self Proclaimed Prometheus - to bring Goldmund Swiss quality and engineering to the normal mortals, other folks like us, not from Gazprom, not German Dentists and not Somalian Pirates.
Goldmund - one of the famous stratospheric prices companies from Switzerland, is now most famous for the scam they were caught red handed with. So much has been written about it that I am not even going to pour fuel to the fire anymore.

Pioneer DVD

http://www.pinkfishmedia.net/forum/showthread.php?t=42879

http://www.goldmund.com/news/2006/05/

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f7/goldmund-v-s-pioneer-285743/

Basically, they learned from THETA - that repackaging a decent Japanese ready product under own box and under own logo/legend will create good selling proposition for naive nuveau-riche.

Some honest people modify stock products and sell under original brand, adding own stamp of "tuning". But fooling people like Goldmund did is really disgusting.

So much temptation for me to try and better Goldmund on quality from stock Pioneer DV-300!

I mean, what could be a better description of repackaging totally unmodded stock Pioneer and attach this marketing text ! Just read carefully what a load of bullshit:

From Goldmund Mission Statement:

At Goldmund, we strive to lead in the creation, development and manufacture of the industry's most advanced technologies, including audio and video systems, home- networking and music distribution.

The guiding principle at Goldmund is to produce a precise sound with the least possible loss of quality through the different stages. Goldmund will never adopt a technology before it is sufficiently developed to satisfy the quality standards we set. In that sense Goldmund is not the company for early adopters. "

Very refreshing

And about the eidos:

Goldmund Releases Eidos 18 SACD/DVD-A Player in U.S.

Goldmund America has announced that their Goldmund Eidos 18D Multichannel SACD/DVD-A player is now available is the U.S. market at a suggested list price of $8,900. Goldmund is well known for their high end audiophile products that include turntables, CD and DVD Video players, speakers, preamps and amps. All of their products are made at Goldmund's factory in Switzerland.

More on the Goldmund Eidos 18D
The Eidos 18D debuted in Europe in March as part of the company's "high end" audio product line and has been a very successful product for the company. In fact, Goldmund says that they have had to ramp up production of the Eidos 18D at the factory to meet the demand to date for the product.

The Eidos 18D player is capable of playing back Audio CD, DVD Video, Multichannel SACD, Multichannel DVD-A, CD-R, CD-RW, MP3 and CD Video optical discs. It is also capable of playing DVD-R and DVD-RW discs in DVD Video mode. The player features a "rigid steel cell structure" chassis that supports the 18D's internal circuitry, a power supply that uses Goldmund's "AC Curator" and Goldmund's "mechanical grounding" construction that is said to produce "exceptional CD and DVD playback quality". It also features the following signal outputs:

6 Channel Analog Output for Multichannel SACD and DVD Audio (6 x RCA)

2 Channel Analog Output (2 x RCA)

6 Channel Digital Audio Output (RCA & Toslink)

Component Video Interlaced Output (3 x RCA)

RGB and Component Video Progressive Outputs (5 x BNC)

S-Video Interlaced Output (S-Video)

DVI Digital Video Output (DVI)

According to Goldmund "The Eidos 18 Multiformat turntable is based on Goldmund’s experience in designing the Eidos 38, the most accurate CD and DVD transport ever designed. Extending the same construction principles to a multiformat unit, able to play not only DVD and CDs but also SACD and DVD Video, the Eidos 18 also includes D/A to become the most versatile player in the industry. The Eidos 18D adds to these features the same progressive RGB Video and Digital Video Output circuitry as the Eidos 38D, the best Video player ever designed."

Early reports on the Goldmund suggest that the Eidos 18D player is in the same league as the well received TEAC Esoteric DV-50 as the top SACD/DVD-A/DVD-Video/CD players to date. If that's the case, it will be worth auditioning when it shows up at U.S. Goldmund dealers.

Ufff, we can land back on Earth .....

IMPROVING THE PIONEER DV-300

What can be done about the 80 USD stock Pioneer dv-300 to make it better?
Out of the box it is an excellent DVD player and good CD transport.
It works with Lampucera DAC like a dream.
But of course this can be further improved.

Pioneer DVD

The yellow wire is the key to quality - jumping across the SP/DIF traces - pur esignal straight to RCA (new socked just drilled and installed)

Pioneer-Goldmund

First - the SP/DIF signal comes from its source - DSP chip - a very long way. The trace is impossible to trace. It goes up and down, disappears in the 4 layer PCB and goes through resistors, caps etc.
I tried a number of tricks but I finally found the pin where SP/DIF is being generated.
Then I floated it and took it to new RCA for SP/DIF by a wire. I tried 75 Ohm resistors, some decoupling caps, but finally - the best sound is just from plain straight direct connection. No 75 Ohms, no coax cable, no series capacitor.
The SP/DIF trace is THE BEST I have seen in my life. It is unbelievably square ! Just look:

Now if that is not goddamn good trace then what is ?
Now we know why Goldmund picked this player as their choice.

Connected to my Rockna and Lampucera DAC's - the Pioneer already sounds like a good transport. It opened up by a wide margin in the top frequency department. Trebles are like on adrenaline now.
I noticed that Goldmund did not do it my way - they use standard stock output. Visibly inferior on scope trace.

I left the project there because I did the difficult bit of finding the source of the Amazon river. You are welcome to:
1. Replace stock electrolytes with OScons or Blackgates on the signal board
2. Double or triple cap sizes on the power board
3. Change clock for after market type (remember it is the DVD frequency of 27 MHz)
4. Place bituminous felt on top cover inside
5. Arrange a stable plinth. I suggest to cut MDF in the size as the player floor and GLUE the entire floor surface by silicon or other soft adhesive to the DVD. This will be the best stabilization
6. Use AC filter and good cord.
This player will be probably - as a transport - as good as Goldmund or better.
The final touch would be to FLOAT the main DSP chip power supply, and buy a small transformer for 12 V / 10 Watts, and rectify the AC and add a 5 V DC regulator, add a large oscon - and wire the clean 5VDC to the chip directly, creating supply independent of the switching unit it has originally.

Not all that glitters is Goldmund.

Some weeks after

By a coincident during some works on the player my friend Arturo Artpaw discovered, that when he accidentally stopped the CD disc by finger - the music continued to flow for 2 seconds or so.
THAT'S IT ! The secret of Goldmund Transport! The player has a digital data buffer, an INTERNAL GENESIS DIGITAL LENS. Add to the picture the reclocking and also the super square S/PDIF and voila. You have a good transport for the price of a parking ticket.

A link to some more story about rocket sciencists from Goldmund:

Start Page

Update list

Speakers

Amplifiers

Transport

Lampucera

Alphabetical

Tripath

Download Lampizator

TDA1541A