What Is The Best CD Changer Player Out There?


I'm looking to add a "secondary" CD Changer to my main system. For those times when I'm in and out of a room, but want good, clean sound. A player that not only sounds good, but is also mechanically reliable. Player price on the used market should not exceed around $1500, and the McIntosh is not in consideration at this time. My system is comprised of a Classe CA401 amp, Krell HTS 7.1 pre-pro & Piega P10 speakers. All input welcomed.
george3
I would think that one of the TRL modified Sony units would be an excellent choice. The super inexpensive 595 SACD changer got great reviews and some of the newer units are supposed to be even better. How about the Sony 2000ES SACD changer with TRL mods. I've heard it was a really sweet player and it would be well under your price limit.

You could also buy a Sony DVP-NC555ES for about $300 and send it off to SACDmods for their fully 5 channel mod at about $400. For a little over $700, your would have a good performing and good looking redbook, SACD, DVD-video deck. I'm thinking about this one myself!

Enjoy,

TIC
George, I haven't gone the server route. The cambridge Azur 640H looks interesting but seems to be designed for systems with a TV. The I-pod as I use it (load and forget) is really very easy. You just need access to a recent PC and time to sit and load your cds (several hours), once you do the settings all you are doing is putting cds in click load then reapeat when they are done. Once the music is on the ipod you don't need a computer again except to add music. Play with one at best buy or something. They have remote controls now as well that you can add. Very easy to sell if you find you don't like it as well.

As to the 333, it has worked fine for me but changers may be one of the riskiest buys with all the moving parts. TIC may have a good idea about the current sony changers either modded or not. I don't know if the new players are better but my main gripe with the 333 which is a sacd / cd player is that operation is slowed because it checks for sacd status on every disk....bottom line is a 15sec pause between tracks on random...not seemless backgroung music if that is what you are looking for but these new sonys have very good sound for the price.
NIK
I have the Adcom GCD-600 changer(has been great) that I have running as a transport out to a AA DTI Pro and then to a PS Lambda Ultralink Dac. I am thinking of modding my cd player changer system with a modder, any input out there. To go back to a single player sysyem like the Meridian 508.24 will never happen for me, just a matter of using my system as background music so much of the time.
I am intrested in a low-jitter changer as well. I have so many CDs, I just don't have time to rip them all to a hard drive or what have you. Not only do you have to extract the bits, but you have to type track titles, etc.. What I would like to find is a well clocked and reliable CD changer that can handle, say, 10 CDs. I guess I could settle for 5 if I had to but I think 10 would be better.
A relatively inexpensive changer that sounds unusually good is the Decware DEC-685. This is a modified Sony DVP 685 changer and is now discontinued. However, I believe Decware may still have some for sale. I have had one for over a year without any problem. It works well as a player or transport. The modification implemented is merely adding a tube stage to the output of the decoder chip and bypassing all conditioning and hardware filter circuits.

http://www.decware.com/SACD/sacd.htm