New or Old CD Player?

@trelja "I cannot recommend the Hegel Mohican...

Like the rest of their players, it simply comes off as a rebadged Opera Audio Consonance CDP, typical of that outfit's efforts in the first 5 years of this millennium. At $5000, you're spending 2X - 5X for machines that proved historically unreliable and more than decade old technology."

Based on the internals @twoleftears provided, I must reiterate my non-recommendation of the Hegel Mohican.  Comparing the rear panels of the Consonance CD120 Balanced shows what appears the reintroduction of a $1000 machine, discontinued 12 years ago with a new faceplate, digital output, downgraded CD mechanism, and going completely against better and better digital becoming more and more affordable, a price tag 5X higher than it used to be

http://www.canuckaudiomart.com/details/649267251-consonance-cd120-balanced/images/1202196/

https://www.stereolifemagazine.com/news/item/1235-hegel-mohican

Personally, I find this dirty pool.  And I'm going to call it out.

I have a lot of experience with the original.  In no way do I feel it's not an excellent sounding CD player.  At its price point, it bettered most of its competitors.  And for a few hundred dollars, I heartily recommend anyone to move forward, and would even feel happy to have one myself.  But $5000 bought much better performance then (even within the Consonance lineup itself via the Reference and Droplet models) and even more so today.  Indeed, Mohican seems the appropriate moniker

The nearest contenders are the Primare CD35 using ESS Sabre chipset and TEAC transport, and Bryston BCD-3 using AKM chipset (AK4490) and (Austrian) StreamUnlimited transport.

@monkandmozart. Why the dissection of the Reference 8?? Why not? I think the most important aspect of a component is how it Sounds. And I thought there might be some who would like an opinion on how the Ref 8 sounds. Otherwise, we can just all sit around and chat about bits and microchips.