CD transports; do they really matter

Cannot believe a rep would say that about his own products.

Why not? He was completely upfront about it and contributed to the conversation in a helpful way, offering another way of seeing things, making some good points for consideration. 

All the best,
Nonoise

In my experience, a CD transport over a CD player is the way to go.  I began using my CD player as a transport when I bought a new DAC as it was sonically better than the CD player's internal DAC.  After a period of time, I took a chance and replaced the CD player as a transport with a used 47-Labs Flat-Fish transport and again, heard a noticeable sonic improvement.  Recently, I upgraded to a new CD transport (Jay's-Audio CDT-2 Mk 2), it was obvious that this new transport was sonically better than the 47-Labs transport.  Plus it has several types of outputs rather than just SPDIF.  I'm using the HDMI I2s output from the Jay's-Audio.  The older 47-Labs Flat-Fish is still a good transport, but the Jay's-Audio transport has proven to be more sonically satisfying to me.  If your CD player's transport/circuitry is of really high quality, you may not experience the need for a separate CD transport, however with the number of really high-quality DAC's out there, as well as reasonably priced high-quality CD transports available, you may want to do a comparison for yourself.  I personally don't know of a CD player that matches the sonic quality of a great CD transport and DAC combination.  This is also because I like to spin discs and don't necessarily want to load it into my music-server.  

Confirmation bias is rampant here! If anybody remembers way back Theta sold a transport that was actually a DVD player (intact including front fascia and buttons) inside a metal case for thousands of $$$! The reviewers at TAS loved it - along with other audiophools! Nothing like a fancy case and a high price tag to attract the gullible! It is easier to con someone than to convince someone that they have been conned!