New transport or repair CD player

Did you ask the repair shop "how much would you charge to replace the laser in  my cd player?"  Sometime just cleaning, lubricating and maybe a belt? would fix it.

How are you in taking things apart? It doesn’t work as it is. What do you have to lose? Just be careful.

I haven’t taken apart a Maridian cd player apart but cd and dvd drives are pretty much the same,

I suggest cleaning the laser head and lubing the rails that the head moves on.

While in there you can look other loading problems that I had with drives. Message me.

If best sound quality is your goal; one of the dedicated transports mentioned above probably is the way to go.

If budget is the priority, then find another competent repair shop. $500 seems very expensive if it truly is a laser assembly swap out.

Before any of that a little player maintenance as Kingsleuy suggested seems prudent if you were satisfied prior to the malfunction.

Audiolab CDT6000 sounds very good, has IEC connector so you can upgrade power cord in the future. 

Pro-Ject DS2T is also a very good sounding unit. Advantage over CDT6000 is an extra AES/EBU output. Downside, it uses a wall wart power supply. I don’t particularly mind it but prefer linear and ability to upgrade power cord. 
I didn’t find anything major to complain about with DS2T. One thing worth noting is the bass is ever so slightly on the lean side which could be a product of the DH Labs AES/EBU cable I was using with it. 
Ultimately I ended up sending it back as I preferred streaming in my system, it sounded at least as good or better than CD and made it hard to justify adding a transport. 

Meridian is expensive to buy, and to fix. The Repair Shop in GA has a monopoly on their parts and they have the expertise to be sure. Trust them to send it back in tip top working order. Those players are hard to beat. 

I sold my 508.24 earlier this year primarily because of its age and my fear that if it broke, it would be expensive to fix or impossible to fix due to the lack of parts. I spoke to my local Meridian dealer, and he advised against spending any money to repair such an old unit if it broke (but of course he wants to see me new stuff).  I sold the 508 to The Music Room and they listed it for over $900.  I recall seeing some other on-line classifieds for the 508 in that price range. In my case, I mostly stream, so I just bought an inexpensive CD player (that matches my integrated amp) and connected it to an external DAC.

I think the practical answer is to just get a new transport if you are using an external DAC.  If you like the looks of the 508 or have an emotional connection to it, it is a tougher call.

I'm curious about what external DAC you are using, because I thought the 508 was pretty damn good as a stand-alone CD player, even by today's standards.