Good CDTransport (player) without DAC?

As previously mentioned the CXC is fantastic value. I use one with my W4S Anniversary DAC & it's an awesome combo.
You would have to spend $hit loads more to achieve small gains.

I have heard the majority of the above transports and a few more. To me and most of the people whom we auditioned a bunch of transports we all still prefer the CEC. The current TL5 model is a great sounding transport new on eBay for a little over $1100. You have to convert the internal wires for US operations though, which is a simple swap or send it to me and I will do the swap at not charge. For a budget transport get a NANO and use a better power supply versus the tiny wall wart that is provided. That CD Transport was amazing for the $400 I paid new for mine. It was not embarrassed by my Audiomeca Mephisto II which is the best transport I have heard and owned in the $6500 price range. The other recommendations are good but in comparison are slightly less in sound quality then the ones I recommend. Plus we did the comparison in three different systems just to make sure we did a fair comparison. There are plenty of older transports that are very good but parts availability is becoming an issue with lasers.  The Rega is also very good even the used ones (Apollo and Saturn) but give up a little in the mid-range for overall sound quality.

Happy Listening.

...so after abit of research: new Jay's Audio CDT2-MK2, or vintage SONY XA5400 ES (some believe it sounds better than my MARANTZ SA-8001)

McIntosh MCT450

Cayin Mini-CD - affordable in the extreme, tray-less front loader and uses external PSU so upgrade is easy.

http://https//item.taobao.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.14.39.534e6fbcvKbTaA&id=541797941560&ns=1&abbucket=1#detail