Comparing external DAC to CD player DAC

totally disagree with "old mac is the problem". I wont get into either the theory nor my extensive step by step subjective testing - but done right it can be as good as anything. But there are many pitfalls to ANY computer based streamer. Note i have posted the gory detail several times before. And if apples are truly compared to apples USB is the interface of choice and done right pretty much takes the streamer/server out of the equation.

While we may be encouraged to believe in magic, partly by pompous "engineers who overlook minor details and/or psychoacoustics - if you get it right, anything that is bitperfect and electrically quiet over USB will be identical to any other. Timing is entirely in the DAC. but those two caveats, plus things like upsampling show that the devil is in the details.

Mac into that level dac will fall short of the sound quality that marantz cdp produces. To run a fair comparison and or to determine the real potential if that dac run your cdp into it via spdif. 

I also had Marantz CD-67se.  Not one but two that I purchased 25 years ago from a sale as far as I could recall.  The SQ out of CD-67se is good but nothing special really to write home about.  Both of them quit a while ago.  I replace one of them with the vintage Rotel RCD 855 with the well-known Philips TDA 1541 chip.  It performs brilliantly with detailed treble, warm midrange and solid bass, better than Marantz. 

good gracious - the Rotel 855 was very good at the time and price, but was far from truly audiophile.  I had one - at the price loved it.  (actually i still have it -- somewhere) But i can move into a totally different world with a regular nothing special mac laptop, bitperfect, lossless files, and one of many dacs under $500. Now that i have a solid foundation in what's being discussed somethign is very, very wrong with the OP's experience.