Best SACD/CD Player up to 3000 street price?

Chuck, I have owned both the Meridian 508.24 and the SCD-1 and had them in my system at the same time for a couple weeks, in redbook playback, the Meridian will compete with the SCD-1, contrary to your comments.

Easy call--SCD-1. I bought one about 6 weeks ago. SACD performance is out of this world, and once you've broken in the CD (which takes several hundred hours), it's competitive with anything out there. Dramatically better than what I was using before (Meta Laser 2 feeding GW Labs DSP (in upsampling mode) feeding Theta Casa Nova). Build quality is incredible.

I had both the meridian 508.24 and the sony es777 multi channel.When I use the analogue outputs for two channel,it beats the meridian in all aspects.I got rid of the meridian.

I suppose we will have to chalk it up to different results in different systems; I am confident in what I heard, not just for my seemingly endless comparison, but also from having a friend listen in as well; he has an excellent ear and when trying to chose which player was playing he was right, or wrong, 50% of the time.

I would audition one of the Marantz players. The 8260 is multichannel that is reported to be a premium version of the acclaimed Phillips 1000, there is a new 8300 coming out. I own a SA14, replaced a Wadia 850 with it. It mates very well with the Cardas Golden Reference and with better Transparent cables. The 14 is being updated; the Mk2 version is a tweaked version of the original but I do not know all the details. I find the M players more detailed yet less fatuiging than the Sonys, which are excellent in their own right but not my choice. To make an analogy, I would say if you like the sound of the Cardas GR you will like the sound of the 14.