@hrabieh In my experience the separate transport and DAC set up has always sounded better, but I'm sure there are no absolutes here. I have no experience with Jay's CDP-2 but I can imagine if it's built to the same standards as their transports it's probably a pretty good player.
Plenty of high end CD Players include a DAC. A good transport is a better option for folks who have a specific DAC they want to use for their digital system. I also have a music server that runs through my DAC, so I wanted to run my transport through the same DAC. If you have multiple digital sources you want to run through the same DAC it's usually cheaper to buy a stand alone transport.
If you do buy a CD player that has its own DAC, I recommend choosing one that has digital outputs so that you can bypass their DAC if you find another one you like better. Some CD players also have digital inputs to allow you to run other source components through the onboard DAC of the player. This is a nice feature when the player has a state of the art DAC built in. It allows you to run all your digital through one input on your amplifier for one.
Another thing to mention is I have had bad experiences with CD player mechanisms failing over time. The Jay's transport is very well built, so my hope is that it will last longer than some other players I've had (not low end ones btw) that did nothing but disappoint.
Plenty of high end CD Players include a DAC. A good transport is a better option for folks who have a specific DAC they want to use for their digital system. I also have a music server that runs through my DAC, so I wanted to run my transport through the same DAC. If you have multiple digital sources you want to run through the same DAC it's usually cheaper to buy a stand alone transport.
If you do buy a CD player that has its own DAC, I recommend choosing one that has digital outputs so that you can bypass their DAC if you find another one you like better. Some CD players also have digital inputs to allow you to run other source components through the onboard DAC of the player. This is a nice feature when the player has a state of the art DAC built in. It allows you to run all your digital through one input on your amplifier for one.
Another thing to mention is I have had bad experiences with CD player mechanisms failing over time. The Jay's transport is very well built, so my hope is that it will last longer than some other players I've had (not low end ones btw) that did nothing but disappoint.