Bryston BCD-1 compared to more expensive players?

i have had bcd-1 for at least 10 months - to me it is one of the top 3 players i have ever owned - i don't know if it compares to players 4-5 times its price - but it def sounds very good and it has hard hitting dynamics and has great seperation

It doesn't make bad recordings sound good (the old cliche) - but on good recordings it sounds marvelous

I have a Bryston BCD-1 and I absolutely love it. I haven't compared it to anything else more expensive nor do I feel the need to. For one thing, I couldn't afford anything more expensive so it would be a waste of time. As far as I'm concerned, it's the best bang for the buck. I was using a Rotel RCD-1072 and the Bryston is far superior.

The Sony SCD-XA5400ES beats the Bryston BCD-1 at half the price in a head to head comparison!

Not to say anything negative about the Bryston, I previously owned Bryston pre and power amplification and was very happy with it until I evetually upgraded to the Krell FPB cx series. I did audition the BCD-1 last year and did some careful listening and feature comparisons to the Cambridge Audio 840c. While I felt they were close in audible performance, I also concluded that the feature/performance/$$$ ratio favored the Cambridge player and so I purchased one. The Bryston player's performance was solid though. It's just that I was looking for the sound and DACs that I got with the Cambridge.

Don, could you be more specific as I was going to buy the Bryston, to replace my Shanling, but am now interested in the Sony. Thanks.