audio aero capitole cd player

The Audio Aero Capitole Mk II has been in my system for a few years now. It is a very fine CD player but it is not up to the task of equaling vinyl on a competent turntable/arm/cartridge properly set up. It wouldn't take the Well Tempered in my system, let alone the Versa. But all that said, there is an awful lot of good music that is sadly not availbe on vinyl. So I would say that a good CD player is a must. As is a good FM tuner for that matter - assuming you live near a station that actually puts some effort into broadcasting a good signal that isn't compressed all to hell. I'm lucky to have KPLU close by. And well, if you don't have a good turntable you won't know what your are missing. It's like everything else in this hobby. Until you hear something better than you've ever heard you can't really imagine how something could sound better. Well once you get to a certain level, of course.

That's enough rambling from me.

Mem 916 gives great advise. You need both to fully explore all the great music out there. I have owned the Capitole II SE for 3 or so years and think very highly of it. It's a fantastic player and especially great value when you consider it can function without a preamp, I don't think you can do much better for the money on the used market.

I recently bought a Whest phono stage and a used Nottingham Horizon table with a Dynavector 10x5 cartridge (used for 700 bucks) This analog setup is so much better sounding to me than digital, it's not even close. It's almost as if the digital and analog aren't even comparable it's that much better, and I'm only at the entry level of analog, although I did get a pretty decent phono stage (2500.00 for that part)

Analog is not without it's hassels, there are going to be some pops and clicks to learn to live with and you must clean are care for your records. To me it's worth it, my interest in listening has taken a leap forward since getting into vinyl, it's so much better than I thought it would be.

You may not be able to find everything on vinyl, but there is also a lot of older vinyl that you can't get on CD. I made a visit to an excellent store (Amoeba records in Berkeley) and found the selection and quality excellent. For now I'm taking in lots of new music that may be old, but it's new to me.

Sorry to ramble on, but I just thought I'd share my enthusiasm with you. I have also owned the Prima, and while it does sound very good, it's not quite the equal of the Capitole and when you factor in the need for a preamp then the Capitole pulls ahead. If you already own a preamp that you intend on hooking up the Capitole to then get the Prima, it is about 80% of the Capitole when both are hooked up to a preamp.

Hi All,
Sorry to chime in but the AA Capitole is on my list as well although I am very close to pulling the trigger on a Modwright Sony. To clarify, if you have a pre-amp already, is it still worth the extra bucks for the Capitole? Do you simply disable the preamp in the Capitole or is this a false economy and are you better off considering other players to use with a separate pre-amp?
Thanks

Unless you still want to listen to vinyl the Capitole releases you from a pre. This is especially true if you buy the newest version with analog passthru for your tuner. The older versions of the Capitole are updatable with a new circuit board to also take an analog signal. It is probably true that the best vinyl systems will always beat out the best CDs. Having said that I care not to own two big sources (vinyl and CD) and have to bounce back-n-forth. I bought my Capitole from a fellow who has a huge vinyl library and, while he loved the CD player he just couldn't go on to duplicate what he already had in vinyl.

The Capitole is a wonderful unit that relieves you from vinyl and SACD as it does a great job with normal redbook. I also run my satellite through it via toslink, DVD player with coax and it even allows me to bi-amp the Capitole using RCA and XLR outputs so the Capitole services two rooms in my home.