Hello Everyone,
This is a review and detailed measurements of the PROCEED PCD 3 CD Player and Transport.
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It is on kind loan from a member, thanks ever so much to him for allowing me to torture his CD Player!
PROCEED PCD 3 - Presentation
The first iteration of this CD Player was released in 1989 (
reviewed by Stereophile) and this 3rd one (the last) seems to have been released only a couple of years later. As you can tell, the look deviates a lot from what was the standard of the time. But I really like a lot that industrial/pro look. The PCD 3 weights a surprising 27lbs (12.24kg). The retail price was a high $3500.
From what I could gather, PROCEED was a child company of Madrigal, also owning Mark Levinson. PROCEED was created in 1989, to offer less expensive devices compared to ML, and also used as some sort of incubator, for the introduction of new tech to the market. Madrigal was acquired by Harmann group and roughly 10 years later, the PROCEED brand disappeared in 2002.
I was very interested in testing this CD Player because it uses the rare BurrBrown PCM63, in its most linear "K" version. This is the first release of the Colinear conversion from BurrBrown, which was obviously co-developped with Denon, and a prototype of that conversion was released in the
Denon DCD-3560, and I talked about it in details during that review.
The back of the CD Player shows luxury with balanced connectors on top of unbalanced:
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We get only one SDPIF output.
Let's have a look at the inside:
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At the back, the vertical card host the digital filter from NPC and the two BurrBrown PCM63K. After removing the protective plate, we get to see them:
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The 8x oversampling digital filter from NPC (SM5803) is partially hidden. Unfortunately, no trimming for me to play with the PCM63K. It was optional and I must admit kind of a nightmare to adjust, as I described the procedure with the
Denon DCD-3560.
This 20bits PCM63K replaced the 18bits PCM58 in the initial PROCEED PCD. The servo board was also updated, it is the vertical board on the right:
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This new board is based on the Philips SAA7310 (servo control, decoder, error correction, ...). Note that this board hosts a dedicated xtal branded Madrigal
The drive is from Philips too, a full metal faster than light CDM1.
To close this presentation, find below the specs of the time (from the User Manual):
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User Experience
Although I don’t generally like soft buttons, I must admit that the ones of the PROCEED are nice to press.
The drive is absolutely silent, this is impressive. Ultra fast too, I can’t believe it can skip so many tracks at once in total silence. That I really love! FFW/REW are a delight to use too and make my day as that shortens time for the measurements.
And yes, not only it correctly applies de-emphasis when necessary, it is also gapless, this is a proper CD Player
I listened to it via an SMSL A50III and my good old Beyer DT770 Pro. I was nothing else but pleased.
PROCEED PCD 3 - Measurements (Analog out)
All measurements performed with an E1DA Cosmos ADCiso (grade 0), and the Cosmos Scaler (100kohms from unbalanced input) for analog outputs, and a Motu UltraLite Mk5 for digital.
I am now consistent with my specific measurements for CD Players, as I described them in the post “
More than we hear”, and as I reported them for the
SMSL PL-200 review. I used the commercial version of my
Audio Technical CD for all measurements. Over time, this will help comparing the devices I reviewed.
The PCD 3 outputs 4.232Vrms from both the left and right balanced channels. From unbalanced I got 2.114Vrms for both channels, meaning perfect matching for Left and Right channels, which was a positive surprise since these are mono DACs. Both XLR and RCA respects absolute polarity, and the phase is dead flat, indicating a symmetrical impulse response (see later).
The measured performances were the same from XLR or RCA, so I'll review from the former only.
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Let's start with my standard 999.91Hz sine @0dBFS (without dither) from the
Test CD:
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We get a bit of distortion (-100dBr) and I am not surprised from an old R2R DAC. I could have probably done better with the trimming pots of the two MSB adjust, if only Madrigal engineers had put them.
Note that the calculated SNR is surprisingly good, reaching the near theoretical max (98dB) despite the presence of that high level test tone. On that perspective, the PROCEED does better than the Denon DCD-3560, but suffers a little more distortion.
Let's check if things improve at lower level (-6dBFS):
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Basically same story repeats, we have typical R2R distortion due some small non-linearities of that type of conversion.
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Let's have a look et the Power Supply leakages, the below is a 20Hz to 1kHz zoom with a punishing 512k FFT length to reveal issues:
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Well, not only I already mentioned the good SNR results, but I'm sure you already saw that we don't suffer from power leakage. This is a very silent CD Player, from digital to analog domains.
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Next is the bandwidth (both channels):
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Like I said, the two channels are perfectly matched, and we see a small roll off of -0.2dB at 20kHz. A wider view at the oversampling filter behaviour will tell us more:
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This is a sharp filter, as the linear phase was already telling me. The attenuation of the dual tones (IMD AES) is -90dB and that is good for nearly 40 years ago!
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Next is the multitone test that a lot of you like very much, but you won't be happy with the results:
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Beautiful trace, the PROCEED offers more than 17bits of distortion-free range (both channels are overlaid).
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Let's check the jitter:
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Red trace is from the digital output of the PCD 3 and the blue one from analog. The very small deviations are negligible. Note again the noise floor that is very low.
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Started with the
Teac VRDS-20 review, and on your request + support to get it done (more
here), I'm adding now an "intersample-overs" test which intends to identify the behavior of the digital filtering and DAC when it come to process near clipping signals. Because of the oversampling, there might be interpolated data that go above 0dBFS and would saturate (clip) the DAC and therefore the output. And this effect shows through distorsion (THD+N measurement up to 96kHz):
The NCP interpolator of the PROCEED has no headroom for intersample overs as so many other CD Players. Too bad since so
many CD Masters are recorded too hot.
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Let's continue with the good old 3DC measurement that Stereophile was often using as a proof of low noise DAC. It is from an
undithered 997Hz sine at -90.31dBFS. With 16bits, the signal should appear (on a scope) as the 3DC levels of the smallest symmetrical sign magnitude digital signal:
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Fantastic trace for the time, I have to say. The three DC levels are perfectly represented, at the correct level, with little added low noise (if you want to know more about this test, read the SMSL PO100 PRO
review).
On that, I add that the PROCEED showed exceptionnal linearity down to -110dBFS, which is exceptionnal for and R2R architecture of the time. Thanks to the complex "Co-linear" conversion that was removing the 0-crossing problem from the equation, hence improving linearity.
By the way, that view reminds me (because of the symmetrical ringing we see above), that the impulse response indeed shows it is a Fast Roll-Off Linear Phase filter:
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Other measurements (not shown):
- IMD AES-17 DFD "Analog" (18kHz & 20kHz 1:1) : -90.7dB
- IMD AES-17 DFD "Digital" (17'987Hz & 19'997Hz 1:1) : -91.1dB
- IMD AES-17 MD (41Hz & 7993Hz 4:1): -91.3dB
- IMD DIN (250Hz & 8kHz 4:1) : -86.5dB
- IMD CCIF (19kHz & 20kHz 1:1) : -90.8dB
- IMD SMPTE (60Hz & 17kHz 1:4) : -86.8dB
- IMD TDFD Bass (41Hz & 89Hz 1:1) : -104.2dB
- IMD TDFD (13'58Hz & 19841Hz 1:1) : -91.8dB
- Dynamic Range : 98.7dB (without dither @-60dBFS)
- Crosstalk: below measurements (better than -137dBr) at all frequencies
- Pitch Error (GPSDO corrected) : 19'997.05Hz (19'997Hz requested) ie +2.5ppm
- Gapless playback : Yes
The IMD scores are good.
The Dynamic range is best in class.
Crosstalk is impossible to measure, thanks to the dual mono design.
Pitch error is a very small +2.5ppm only, despite utilisation of multiple xtals.
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Last and not least, I like to run a THD vs Frequency sweep at -12dBFS as it shows how the conversion has evolved over time. I am currently using the beta version of REW and I discovered that this sweep gives better and more reliable results than before. I overlayed the results with some of the top of the line R2R based CD Players of the time:
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Have a look at the legend to compare. The PROCEED does good. The Denon achieved better on one channel after I trimmed the two MSB, but I failed repeating the same performance on the right one, which overlays with the PROCEED (not shown). We have here the best in class R2R converter of the time.
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As I did with the
Sony CDP-597, I add a "
max DAC resolution" measurement test. It is performed from a 999.91Hz sine @-12dBFS with shape dither (from Audacity). I restrict the THD+N span to 20Hz - 6kHz in REW not to account for the noise of the shape dither beyond 6kHz. I take the calculated ENOB and simply add 2bits to it (due to the -12dB attenuation, as 1bits=6dB). The potential maximum, when calculated from the digital WAV file, is 18.7bits under this test. A "transparent" DAC should achieve 18.7bits, ie 100% in this test.
Here are the results compared to others:
The PROCEED would have done way better without the distortion, since on a noise perspective I see it 3dB better than the Denon DCD-3560, but that test includes noise and distortion, so... And to illustrate what I just wrote, let me show you an overlay of the PROCEED, the Denon and the WAV file of that test (with 1/48 smoothing to make it clear):
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More distortion with the PROCEED (Green trace) but less noise than the Denon (Orange trace).
PROCEED PCD 3 - Testing the drive
What would be good measurements if the drive would not properly read a slightly scratched CD, or one that was created at the limits of the norm? The below tests reply to these questions.
Here are the results:
| Test type | Technical test | Results |
| Variation of linear cutting velocity | From 1.20m/s to 1.40m/s | Pass |
| Variation of track pitch | From 1.5µm to 1.7µm | Pass |
| Combined variations of track pitch and velocity | From 1.20m/s & 1.5µm to 1.40m/s & 1.7µm | Pass |
| HF detection (asymmetry pitch/flat ratio) | Variation from 2% to 18% | Pass |
| Dropouts resistance | From 0.05mm (0.038ms) to 4mm (3.080ms) | 3mm |
| Combined dropouts and smallest pitch | From 1.5µm & 1mm to 1.5µm & 2.4mm | Pass |
| Successive dropouts | From 2x0.1mm to 2x3mm | Pass |
Wow! This is a first with such an old drive. The PCD 3 had no issues up to 3mm and then suffered only a few audible clicks but did not stop nor drop. This is a very good surprise for a drive that is that fast.
PROCEED PCD 3 - Digital Output
Ok, so it's a very good CD player. A little more can be expected from an external DAC, and for that we need to check if it outputs a "perfect" digital stream. And, from my standard 999.91Hz @0dBFS file...:
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Yes, exactly what we need as this is the same with the WAV file.
The 3DC test is nailed too:
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My ultimate proof of "perfect" digital output is when I reuse the intersample overs test at 5512.50Hz, with a phase shift of 67.5°, like I did for the
TASCAM CD-200 review. This signal generates an overshoot of +0.69dB and so if the signal would be modified before being sent (by an ASRC for instance), it would show either a reduction of amplitude or we'd see some sort of saturation/increase noise/distorsion. So here we go:
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Yep, this is again same as the original WAV file, a good indication that the digital is what we want it to be, perfect!
Conclusion
This is/was a very well designed CD Player. The modular internal layout was a good idea, for regular updates, and obviously there was some level of engineering going on here.
Fact is this is nearly the best CD transport I tested, with super resistance to problematic CDs, and a super fast addictive drive.
I'm not sure the industrial look will be everyone's taste, it is everything but standard, and a classic?
Cheers
PS: I realized I named it PDC instead of PCD in many graphs, my bad, I'll try to update when time allows.
