DAC for carousel cd player?

From what I can see on the web, your player has a toslink digital out.  You can connect this to the input of virtually every dac and it should be a significant improvement.  Will you hear it?  I don't know.  You would connect the toslink output on your Pioneer to the toslink input of the dac and then use a pair of interconnects to connect the dac to the preamp.  If you give your budget, you will soon have enough recommendations to make your head spin. 

Wow, great thank you so much for responding and explaining chayro!

Hadn't thought about budget as I wasn't even sure if this made sense to do and if it was even possible...That said I guess I'd like to keep it under 1K if possible?

Thank you again for taking the time to respond:)

Get a Topping DAC for $300. Excellent SQ! Why spend more?

I agree a better DAC should make a nice improvement.  I’ve had a Rotel prepro and am familiar with the house sound, so I’d recommend a DAC that’s not too analytical and has a little flesh on the bone as it were or the result may be a little fatiguing.  The Schiit Modius is only $199 and offers a relatively robust sound for a cheaper DAC so may be a good fit with your Rotel and yield significant overall improvements.  Add a decent toslink cable that shouldn’t be very expensive (sorry I’ve no experience with them so no specific recommendation) and you’re good to go.  Best of luck. 

Does the Pioneer have a coax RCA digital output? If so I recommend using that instead of the toslink (plastic) optical output. The best optical digital outputs are glass fiber. Toslink falls short! A 75 ohm 1.5 meter RCA cable will sound much better than a toslink!