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Comparing these CD players with my gear...

Hi folks, 

I'm always messing around with CD players. A longtime audio friend of mine says I have a CD fetish... well, he's probably right. In a medium that is slowly dying, I'm still spinning discs more than ever. I stream too, but there still something awesome about taking a CD or LP and placing it in/onto a machine to play the sweet music we all love. 

Anyway, in my latest jaunt for something new, I've put together my latest list of players that have caught my eye for one reason of another. My gear consists of a Creek 4330SE integrated amp and Vandersteen 2C speakers. Cables are DH Labs Q-10's and Air Matrix interconnects. 

So what are your thoughts/impressions/comments on the synergies of the following CD players and how they would sound with my gear. I'm most curious about the Naim, Cambridge Audio and Myryad. 

Naim CD3.5
Cambridge Audio 840c
Myryad MCD600
Cal Audio Labs Icon mkII Power Boss
Marantz CD6006 (or CD6005)
Rotel RCD-1072




jsbach1685
mahler123
3,441 posts
 
To the OP
are you looking for other features?  Do you want to play Blu Ray, or USB drives, or perhaps DVD-A?  I know that CD is your priority, but you can can get a good transport, such as the new Sony Universal Player, discussed on other threads here for $300.00. If you like the sound of the internal DAC then you are done; if not lots of great DACs in the $500-$1000 range
jsbach1685 OP
145 posts
 
Hi mahler123 and everyone... 

No, I don't need a bunch of extra features. This is for a straight 2-channel system, so no need for blu-ray or USB. I went with the Naim, so that should give you a good idea :)

I have an old iPhone 5 & that I use exclusively for streaming Apple Music... which is connected directly into an HRT iStreamer, then into my Creek integrated via DH Labs Air Matrix RCA's. I also sometimes use my iPod Classic, which contains about 2000 songs from my CD collection... downloaded in AIFF format.

As for the DAC discussion; for me, I just go with what sounds good to my ears because ultimately that's the bottom line here. Some of my favorite CD players had DACs from Phillips (TDA1541A, TDA1305), Burr-Brown (PCM54), Wolfson (WM8740), dCS ring (Arcam Alpha 9), Cirris Logic and others. Whether they're PCM, multi-bit or 1-bit doesn't matter to me. In the end, what I'm hearing is the manufacturer's interpretation of the analog stage. 

  
dcbingaman
93 posts
 
The Oppo 105D is the Swiss army knife for the little silver disc, and it is also a very good streamer.  In other words, it will play anything the cat drags in.  I use mine to feed a Meridian G68 DAC / preamp via HDMI into a Meridian 621 hub for all things digital.  In this application, it is as good as anything out there, (but Meridian is in another league from most other digital gear, so the Oppo is basically a transport.)  I haven't listened to its analog outputs, but I owned and have listened extensively to an Oppo 95 and it was pretty good - not Meridian good, but pretty good for a CD player.  Oppo is moving on to UHD, so if you want an Oppo 105D, you need to move pretty quickly.  Reportedly the new Oppo UHD players will have fewer features than their recent BDP players.

emoman59
1 posts
 
I have two Emotiva cd players, ERC 2 and ERC 3 solid build and great sounding, especially for the price
digsmithd
913 posts
 
I recall reading that oppo will have a more dedicated audio model as well?
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