+1 ericsch I run that player and for the money, well it's very decent and of course one may add an external DAC and greatly improve it. The shoebox design I like also. Very solid build. Cheers
First CD player help!
Hi everyone,
I am going to the darkside....
But only in my bedroom :)
I am a turntable enthusiast. It's been my only source for many years but I recently setup a turntable in my bedroom system and honestly do not enjoy having to get out of bed to flip the record and because I'm not actively listening I feel I'm not getting everything from the listening experience I would in front of my main.
I know all about streaming and love it but only for when I'm on the subway, my car, running around etc. When given all of the world's music my ADD head wants to move onto the next artist, album or song, before whats playing even finishes. I miss selecting a piece of physical media, putting it on and letting it play.
So that got me thinking about CDs.
I'm a young(ish) guy, 30 and got into music around the same time the first MP3 players hit the market so never really got into CDs. I recently purchased a guy's entire CD collection (400plus) and am now trying to figure out a decent CD player to add to my bedroom system and possibly down the road another for my main rig.
My bedroom setup is tube based. Rogue RP1 pre, Rogue ST-80 amp, Vandersteen 3Asig speakers. And one of those cheap Schiit Dacs.
I think I'd rather go CD player vs transport at this time. And would like to spend around $500 (either new or used works for me).
Thanks in advance for any advice.
Cheers,
Sammy
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I recently bought a new Denon DCD-800ne CD Player for $499 and love it. I had not bought a new CD player in 30 years (my Sony and even older Magnavox were mostly doing fine). However, nothing lasts forever, and I have a fairly large collection of about 1200 CDs I want to continue to play. Yeah, I do streaming too, but CDs still sound a touch better for whatever numerous reasons. |
That’s interesting. What are some examples of the many late model CD players which don’t have gapless playback? I’ve ever only experienced CD players with (normal) precise gapless playback. edit I see an earlier comment where the Emotiva player is non gapless. So, that's one. This is all news to me. |
noske, I had been looking at a Yamaha CD-S303 but had a live chat with a Yamaha tech and the CD-S303 does NOT have gapless playback. That is so aggravating in the sub-$500 price point region. Otherwise for $380 it had everything else I wanted...great DAC (a Burr-Brown), a USB input for FLAC and other files, and even coax AND optical outputs for connecting to an external DAC if you ever wanted. So, I ended up getting the similar, but more expensive Denon instead. I liked Denon’s build quality better anyway. The only ones I know for sure that are gapless in this price range are the Denon and the Cambridge Audio ones. Cambridge even advertises "gapless playback" as a FEATURE. LOL. |
Thanks @moonwatcher . Geez, I didn’t realise even one little bit that could be the situation. I wonder if many people get caught out? And not just esoteric - you mention Yamaha!. DACs are perhaps off topic, but I understand that as far as R2R DACs go, the Ares is very good; you need to spend substantially more to get anything even slightly "better" (I don’t like that word in the context of DACs) in the R2R family. Its probably quite wise to pass on a dedicated transport should the Denon prove to be a robust spinner. I’d need to do a properly conducted blind test and be satisfied beyond any doubt about any claimed subjective superlatives before I chuck out my CD player which I use as a transport. Good thoughts about what lies ahead regarding CD spinner technology. Weren't CDs meant to be a dead form of media years ago? My small prediction - there will always be a demand for CD spinners, whatever they may be called. I reserve my right to update this prediction every decade. |
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