Read this, please. Way back in 1997, there was a panel of ''all star'' reviewers- the ones with the better credibility (leaving Sam Tellig out, of course) from different magazines. They got together, all 6 or 8 of them for a shootout between transports of the ''cost-no-object'' category. We are talking Sonic Frontiers esotaria and the like....
The ONE that came out as the all-around best transport .....
Actually a bit of a shocker for everyone involved - The Sony S-7000 DVD player used as a transport.
These findings were published in the now-defunct Planet Hi-Fi website, one of the early great audio website.
If you are still in doubt, please let it be known that some of the world's best loudspeakers ( how about the $ 16,000 Verity Audio Parsifal ) were developped and voiced on systems comprised of this very same Sony S-7000 player, combined with a Meitner Bidat Dac. I know this for a fact, please don't ask me how. Verity then went on to a Sony 7700 and afterwards - get this- a Pioneer 05 DVD player used again, as a transport. I beleive the Fidelio was developped with the latter. They claimed that the nature of the laser pick-up itself, having to focus on smaller pits and dots, made for a more precise, information-gathering system than the regular cd player optical system. Now we are talking pre-2000 era here.
This does not make a DVD transport the best solution today necessarily - but it speaks volumes about it's long-known attributes. And many other manufacturers (speakers, amplifiers, an preamps, even interconnects) also used these very same ''low-cost'' DVD transports in developping THEIR products. Nothing to brag about on their part, probably, but how interesting nevertheless. It just worked for them, with a finger shown in audio snobery's face.
Of course, hi-fi shops would rather sell us expensive transports than a relatively inexpensive DVD player. But that is another story altogether.
I remember walking in audio snob-shops and having salesmen laugh at me when I told them I was using a ''non-audiophike'' Sony S7000 in my system for audio purposes only. I was politely given the old brush-off for lack of knowledge. Then I would take my (multiple-folded) Planet Hi-fi review from my back pocket, show it to them, and watch their mouth be lost with words.
I have been using DVD transports since 1998 and have never looked back. I'm probably missing something, but I sure can't hear it.
