If you already have the dac try to find a real quality vintage transport to go with it or a quality used cd player with the correct digital out to feed the dac you have.
The anachronistic CD Transport? And do I really need one.
CD Transports.
This is a machine that in my early audiophile days I could not afford. I appreciated, philosophically the advantages of it. Thinking of this device in 2021 seems strange. Yet they still exist and, maybe more importantly, they are still manufactured.
Just a few years ago (I dunno...maybe 2015) I remember thinking Redbook CD sounded great with the right DAC, and underlying system of course. But today, I don’t know this to be true. It is starting to seem that the compact disc is riding in the third row of the vehicle, with vinyl and non-cd-digital vying back and forth, musically for the driver’s seat.
So, my listening habits are
Vinyl 65% of the time
Digital 40%
CD 5%
I do have a small collection of CDs. They are things that I cannot easily or actually hear on other mediums.
I have a great DAC and it made an old (2005) Rotel CD player sound pretty good. The Rotel CD player's remote is dead with no easy replacement, and it does have progressive optical reading disease--...it drops in and out with less than perfectly clean discs.
Can you please evaluate the following options for me? Or tell me to piss off!
1. Buy a Transport
2. Buy a CD player (maybe with SACD ability)
3. Dump the discs and stick with your better sounding vinyl and digital.
4. Are you insane for listing as no. 1 "Buy a Transport"? You must be old.
Fire away.
This is a machine that in my early audiophile days I could not afford. I appreciated, philosophically the advantages of it. Thinking of this device in 2021 seems strange. Yet they still exist and, maybe more importantly, they are still manufactured.
Just a few years ago (I dunno...maybe 2015) I remember thinking Redbook CD sounded great with the right DAC, and underlying system of course. But today, I don’t know this to be true. It is starting to seem that the compact disc is riding in the third row of the vehicle, with vinyl and non-cd-digital vying back and forth, musically for the driver’s seat.
So, my listening habits are
Vinyl 65% of the time
Digital 40%
CD 5%
I do have a small collection of CDs. They are things that I cannot easily or actually hear on other mediums.
I have a great DAC and it made an old (2005) Rotel CD player sound pretty good. The Rotel CD player's remote is dead with no easy replacement, and it does have progressive optical reading disease--...it drops in and out with less than perfectly clean discs.
Can you please evaluate the following options for me? Or tell me to piss off!
1. Buy a Transport
2. Buy a CD player (maybe with SACD ability)
3. Dump the discs and stick with your better sounding vinyl and digital.
4. Are you insane for listing as no. 1 "Buy a Transport"? You must be old.
Fire away.
- ...
- 41 posts total
Hello, I just went to my local Hifi store to check out some Rouge preamps and amps. They had a Sony CA777es CD player. It no longer plays SACDs. But the Redbook out of it was incredible. I have an Oppo 205 so I don’t really need it. They had it for $350 plus tax which sounds like a very good deal for a CD player with dog outs. https://holmaudio.com/ They do ship stuff. This component weighs quite a bit so it might be $40 to ship. Maybe I am not right about using it as a transport. The drawer was opening and closing smooth as silk and this sounded incredible. |
The risk of buying an older CD player is that you will not be able to find a replacement for the transport when it fails. That's happened to me twice over the last ten years. As the demand for discs declines the incentive for manufacturers to provide the parts to keep the players going declines as well. |
- 41 posts total