Crazy to buy a 17 year old CD Player?

cmcdaniel5
  Crazy to buy a 17 year old CD Player?

No, definitely not, not if you want the best from a RedBook (pcm) collection.
But you need one of the players that use R2R Multibit conversion to get the best from RedBook (pcm).
Your choice of the ML 390s is OK, but it's a Delta Sigma dac converter based unit, you'll be far better off getting the earlier ML No.39 as it's R2R Multibit PCM1702 and it has the HDCD PMD100 HDCD filter chip, a far better choice.

Cheers George  

I use a ~15 year-old Electrocompaniet EMC 1-UP, and it is both excellent, and built like a tank.

Further info here:

http://www.electrocompaniet.no/products/classic/digital/discontinued/emc1up.html

Buying an older unit is fine if you get a rally good deal.  I would see if the parts are still available or the mfg still supports the unit.  Georgehifi is right about the R2R they do sound better IMO but a good DAC design can make things sound special also.  Happy Listening.

I found the CD3mkll to sound significantly better than the CD2

Thank you all for your time to respond.  I'm hearing from most that its best to move on...kind of thought so myself, just out of the loop for so long and not really sure what is up to the quality I'm used to .

Am open to suggestions on used equipment @ 5yrs old.  Again, max budget is @ $2000 - $2500.  As you can probably infer, I'm very old school with a preference toward analog.  That said I've got so many CDs it makes no sense to walk away from my very nice library.