What are the best CD Player around $3500?

Probably most of the players listed will do a great job. Your jvc player is holding you back so much that all will be a significant improvement. Do you have the opportunity to listen to any of them? I have heard the mac, ayre and cary and could live with any of them. I would rate the cary first, ayre second and the mac third. Resolution with the cary is the best and the sound never gets too etched. I have the same amp paired with von shweikert vr4 jr. The front end I decided to go with is a $500 dac mated to my dvd player. I am extremely pleased and have yet to find something that sounds better.

How about a used wadia 860,

Having owned the 6900 for several years and with a few different CDP's (XA777ES, MAC MCD 205) I would say the the 6900 will make nice music with pretty muchany of the CDP's you listed. I do not think it will mate poorly with any of them. Of the ones you mentioned I have only heard the G08 (with the 6900) and thought it fantastic.

out of all the players in the 1000.00 to 5000.00 range, WADIA is by far my favorite, super smooth 4 volt output on the RCA's vs. the standard 2 volt machines, built way beyond what you could imagine for a cd deck to be, and it is the fullest body sounding unit with the most real sound stage, okay the soundstage is not real it actually sounds double the size it should be, my room went from 8 ft to 20 ft ceilings :)... and truth is I turn on my turntable and can't believe it could get better, but then the wadia warms up after about an hour of use and it is astonishing at how truly analog it sounds but with more weight and of course Bass is top dog out of the wadia but anyone will tell you that, but they are very powerfull sounding CD players, very open and very in your face, most dvd players sound a little rolled off and like you are in the 12th row, but the Wadia is very upfront, like you are standing on stage, could be good for some, could be bad for others, its all in your taste but mine is perfect for me, and It replaced a 3000.00 dollar universal, Yep SACD and all but the Wadia stomped it, I left SACD since and have completly invested in Redbook and Vinyl ...

So for me the beatles and like zeppelin on vinyl are best, but for some other music CD's are better. So I guess you can't really say a turntable is better for everything.

P.s. the Wadia plays Killer tunes even when a bad disc is thrown at it, scratched, MP3, CdR's anything I can think of is flawless.

Alwayssheng, did you end up getting one? If you did please share what you got and how you like it. Phil Brady.