Just to make a clarification due to criticism from some folks at Headfi:
The Cambridge 840C is an OUTSTANDING sounding CD player, and used to be my reference player, until some family tragedies forced me into selling off most all of my system.
I, at that time, preferred it to both the Rega units and the Marantz units, and sold all of them, except for the 840C.
I still regularly recommend the 840C to friends, along with the 8001 and the Rega Saturn.
After the tragedies, I then had to sell off the 840c, and most of my headphone and home systems.
Just recently I fianally purchased a used, fully broken-in, Marantz SA8001, at a bargain price, a used Sennheiser HD650 Equinox headphone cable, and did a trade on some Harmonic Technology Pro-Silway Mk.3 + interconnects.
Well now, my headphone system has NEVER sounded better!
I have never enjoyed my CD's as much as I am now.
I borrowed a friends 840C, and I think that the 8001 simply does more things right, and less things wrong than the 840C.
Right now, the 8001 is my budget reference cd player.
Maybe its a synergy between the Harmonic Tech interconnects and the 8001, or the fact that this 8001 has alot more break-in time than my first one, who knows?
Hope I have cleared any confusions that there may have been.