Big source improvement using CD player

glubson, at least you're not too lazy to wake up. You're on the right path. 😄👍

@puffbojie
You could use EAC (exact audio copy), download it for free.
Copy some CDs to a USB flash drive, stick it into the USB port in the back of your NAD C658, play some music and please share your experience??
A 256 Gb Sandisk cruiser will run you $30-35. If you have one already, this little experiment can cost you just your time. That's 365 full CDs, one for every day (except of course a leap year)

@georgehifi
I have a Cambridge CXUHD (I know, it’s not what you specified) sounds for all intents and purposes the same on "spinning silver" as it does playing WAV files through my system. Yeah of course I do like Cambridge gear also.

I have a Cambridge CXUHD

Not quite as good as the CXC for spinning CD's.
As the CXC has a dedicated linear power supply, and dedicated CD drive, with it's "legendary" ‘S3’ servo design. (whatever that is).

Where the CXUHD uses a SMP (switch mode) power supply and  universal DVD/CD drive, and no S3

Cheers George     

@puffbojie
I still use a DV-50S for playing CD’s, SACD’s and Audio DVD’s on my main system and think it sounds great even after all these years. However, I haven’t used it as a video source since blu-rays came along.
That said, I just tried an old DVD-R and it played fine. The DV-50 was billed as a "universal" player back in the day and although I seem to recall it getting cranky with some -RW discs, this was rare and everything else seemed to work with no problem. How was the DVD-R you attempted to play created?

Question: sometimes I stream YouTube music through my Oppo105 using the USB interface. Why does that sound so much more full than streaming Tidal lossless?