I have owned a Reimyo CDP-777 since 2004 and spent over a month auditioning a dCS Puccini in my system when deciding on a replacement earlier this year. To my ears, the Puccini sounded marginally more detailed and offered SACD replay as well. However, I did not feel that the Puccini dug as deep as the Reimyo which I feel is superior in the bass. What I ended up buying was the dCS Paganini transport and DAC which I feel offers overall superior performance to the Reimyo. I still think the Reimyo offers a seductive musical sound and have not heard a single box 'red book' CD player that betters it. For me the dCS Paganini is an improvement but at substantially higher cost and the additional cost of a MIT Oracle MA digital BNC clock cable and Siltech Classic Anniversary G7 firewire cable has to be factored in if you really want to make the dCS Paganini sing. I was happy that the Puccini I auditioned was fully run in and have heard it delivering amazing performance in my dealer's home system. I have no experience of the Spectral or top end Meridian CD players. The rest of my system is Karan Reference MKII preamp, CJ Premier 350SA power amp, Avalon Indra speakers connected with MIT Oracle MA interconnects and MIT Magnum MA speaker cables. The source components are on a Stillpoints ESS405 equipment rack. Photo link here:- http://s3.photobucket.com/albums/y76/crystalref/
Steve
Steve