Universal Players vs. Dedicated CD/SACD Players

Okay, you can put me solidly in the separates category.  As mentioned above, my Nad C365BEE came and I immediately dropped everything and spooled up some cds.  Wow, Nad makes some nice sounding gear.  It's got more of a 3D soundstage than the Oppo 95, with a nicer balance of warm and detailed.  One track stands out, a shimmering cymbal in which I'd never heard the individual drumstick strikes until now!  

And of course it easily bests the old Marantz.  The 365, which is not a current model, has 4 filters you can pick from for a different sound. It also has a 12v trigger, the Oppo for all of it's swiss army like functions, had neither of this.  Nor the optical input that allows the Nad to act as a DAC!  

I'm not sure how much of these items or the sound is contained in the current Nad C346BEE, but it's worth an audition just based on what the 365 can do.

That's interesting news 213runnin. The all around appeal of the Oppo makes it hard to part with but I am much more concerned about audio than i am the video performance. I was considering the current Emotive ERC-3 which is reasonably priced and gets nice reviews...

cjcomo-

the Omega series was very sweet. Does Classe' still have parts/service for these players?

I agree- NAD makes excellent cd players, especially, the 1990's models.

Oops, I got the model number of my Nad wrong, it's the C565BEE, and the current model I was referring to is the C546BEE.


Beernut, I had the ERC-1 and sold it after becoming dissatisfied with it.  It would freeze up every now and then and I had to power cycle it to get it to work again.  It also skipped the first few seconds of the first track played upon power up, after that it was fine.  I replaced it with the Oppo 95, which did sound superior.

The ERC-3 shouldn't have these issues.  Marantz, Nad and Cambridge all have interesting options.

Thank you. I was wondering last night if I wanted to improve upon redbook cd performance, how much would I need to spend on a dedicated cd player to better the performance of my Oppo BDP-95? I'd be happy with a $100.00 blu ray for video. If I'd have to spend $1000.00+ to improve upon the cd capability of the Oppo which I bought for $500.00 then I'd think harder probably...