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A move has me thinking of a CD changer....?

I have moved to a city that is too far away for any quality FM stations....ie: no Jazz, no NPR/public radio stations..etc. simply two or three Country stations...

I have a very good extensive CD collection and both of my systems CD players are single disc players....so the question is, are there any good sounding CD changers? I could also use a changer with an outboard DAC. And no, I am not putting down Country music, it is just not what I choose to listen to. And to me, online/streaming is too limited in the dynamic range and frequency band width.
jusam
russ69's avatar
russ69
3,514 posts
 
Get a 300 disc Sony changer. If you want FM quality, even a cheap CD player will get you there (actually even cheap players can sound good). Of course keep a high end single disc player for critical listening. 
larryi
4,016 posts
 
I think it would be helpful to know a bit more about what you are looking for, such as: how much have you budgeted for the changer?, how many CDs would you like it to hold?, are you willing to buy something used?, what do you currently use to play CDs and are you hoping for something that is better than this or are you willing to sacrifice sound quality for the convenience of the changer?  I believe that the largest changer, a Sony,  holds something like 400 CDs, but, I don't know when that machine was last made.  

I am very much a CD person, but, I've ripped them all to a server (still keep the CDs).  I don't know how large is your collection; mine is about 5,000 CDs.  From a practical perspective, it is not easy browsing my collection, finding what I want to play, or returning CDs to their proper location in my collection so having everything organized on an iPad, with multiple ways to search for music, ability to make play lists, etc. has become more than a convenience, it is pretty much a necessity.  Particularly with Jazz, it helps that one can search the artist and find CDs where the artist is not the headliner under which I would have filed the CD physically.

Is there a reason why a changer is more desirable than a server?
fiesta75
1,378 posts
 
For me all CD changers I've had were notoriously unreliable, but never had a Sony. I'm in the belief that streaming or putting them on a dedicated server would be the better option.
shtinkydog
686 posts
 

If you're thinking of a basic 5 or 6 CD changer, you're always going to have this problem:  the random feature won't always work.  the player will occasionally only shuffle between 2 or 3 CDs, and not the whole 5 or 6.

I've had 3 changers, and they all did this, a Parasound, a Sony and an Onkyo.  The only thing that would help was to unplug it from the wall for a few minutes.

mahler123
3,353 posts
 
+1 for a streamer with Internet Radio   you will be able to listen to most of the favorite stations that you left behind a discover a zillion more.  
+2 to a streaming service such as Spotify or Qobuz that will allow you to find lots of new music
nothing wrong with CD REplay--it may even sound better than streaming--but a CD changer won't be the best transport.  However, if you have a good DAC, even a crappy CD changer will still probably sound pretty good
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