Tube cdp's and Tubed Output cdp's

I think that meeting your objectives is possible on both sides of the SS/tube line. There are a number of excellent players at step or two up the chain that will improve the midrange, clarity and sound smoother than your Music Hall.

As to your other questions, tubed players have a fleshy roundness in the tones that I've yet to hear from SS players. In fact, I personally would not buy another SS player so long as tubed players are available. I've heard or owned a number of excellent SS players (Gamut, Resolution Audio, SimAudio, Wadia, Levinson, Naim, etc.), and they have a chilling quality that I just don't like. The imaging, dynamics, clarity, and timing are often outstanding with these players, but I am constantly aware that I am listening to recorded music. I can evaluate the music, but I simply cannot lose myself in it.
Just my 2 cents, obviously.

Try and hear whatever you can out there, and you'll certainly get a sense of what suits you best.

I agree with Rcprince's response as well, Jh2os. We have a tube CDP running direct to tube amps, and absolutely love the sound.

Tube output stages help the cheaper players, but somewhat unnecessary in better players.

I disagree wholeheartedly with that statement. If the sonic characteristics of tubes are beneficial in a $1000 CD player, why would those same qualities be diminished or trivialized in the high-dollar players? Answer: they're not. Solid state is solid state, and tubes are tubes. You can simile them to death, but they do not sound the same.

What I read from your initial post Zosima was that in a CD player above $1000, a tubed output stage was somewhat unnecessary. What you said in your second post was that you felt that adding a tubed output stage to a better digital player would not have necessarily increased your level of listening enjoyment. Let's be clear that we are now addressing to two distinctly different issues:

1) Is there a difference between the SS and tube players?
2) Would those differences necessarily effect your listening enjoyment level?

If I read you correctly, then what you're saying is that your personal preference might happen to be a SS player, or it might happen to be a tubed player, yes? Again, if this is the case, no new discoveries here, as everyone has a personal preference. All that I was saying in regards to the first issue is that in a player above $1000, a tubed outstage would render a significant--and to some listeners, a necessary--difference in the sound.

There is no way that an Audio Aero Capitole MKII is going to sound like a Levinson 39, and IMO you would have to address the tube/SS differences between them before you could even hear the baseline sonic variations between the players. Sonic differences between SS and tube in amplifiers unquestionably applies in digital players as well. They simply do not sound the same, and despite some of the very fine SS players I have heard that do many things extremely well, they still have a digital sound to my ear, and I am certain that it has everything to do with the tubed outstage. If it did not make much of a difference, then I would have to ask why modifiers such as APL, Exemplar, Modwright, RAM, and others--considered to be producing among the very best digital players available--opt to use a tubed output stage? Again, I am still discussing whether or not there are differences (issue 1), not whether or not you prefer them (issue 2).

Have I heard every last player out there? No, but I have heard many players costing anywhere from $3K to $10K and more--including Resolution Audio, Levinson, Gamut, Wadia, SimAudio, and others, and I have yet to hear a SS player that reproduced music with the same fleshy, human, palpability that the tubed players do, particularly with voice and piano. I simply disagree with the suggestion that a tubed output stage on even a $10K SS player would not make a marked difference. Because it will. The difference is not marginal in my opinion, rather it IS more like apples & oranges, to use Marco's reference. Now, whether or not you prefer that difference is another issue entirely. That's where YMMV comes in.
Howard

My wife and I recently went to a friend's home and listened to a variety of very fine audio equipment that he has in his stable. Of the three digital sources, we (my wife and I) established an order of preference. Interestingly, he could not hear a lick of difference between the three players. And they were HIS! I suggested that he keep the cheapest of the three and sell the other two.

I'm sorry, Jwin, but your 'study' is inconclusive. Some people don't hear the difference between copper and silver cables, and others could dissertate for an hour on the chasm between the two. I promise you that a sound engineer would guess right every time as to whether the player is tube or SS.

Incidentally, I was in a restaurant three days ago, with five other people, and we all overheard bits of the conversation coming from the next table. While four people guessed that our neighbors were speaking Italian, two of us recognized it as Spanish, which when spoken by Argentines often sounds like Italian. As I said, some may hear the differences while others may not. Some may PREFER the differences they hear, while others may not. Again, YMMV.
Howard