Why use CD Transport instead of computer source


I have been seeking a new digital front end setup and would like some advice on what solution will produce the highest quality digital playback.

My current plan is to add a Slim Devices Transporter possibly mated to an external DAC, after evaluating the Transporter on its own to determine the quality of the internal DAC (which I understand is quite high).

Why would I consider a CD Transport and DAC as an alternative to a computer based source such as this? If I am using EAC to get bit-perfect rips of my CDs and I encode them in a lossless format like FLAC, there doesnt seem like there could be any benefit to using a CD Transport, in fact, the computer based source should be better if the rips are done bit-perfect.

Any comments on why there is still a high end market for CD transports given the availability of top computer based sources like the Slim Transporter?
superquant
I bought one of the original Transporters which I am using at this moment. I route it through the Audio Aero Capitole's DAC as I think it sounds much 'warmer' while the Transporter's DAC which is relly good, just a bit too 'bright', or as some would say, more 'analytic'.

To get back to your question, my original CDs do sound better using the AA's transport than the music ripped into my Apple G5 using lossless routed to my Transporter via CAT6 cable and using the AES EBU cable to the Capitole.

I suspect the reason might be that the AA is first a CD player and it was made to work its magic on a CD, with the other digital sources not being so harmonious.

Still, last night I doownloaded the Transporter's latest software upgrade and this morning it sounds, I believe, even better.
I don't think the two are mutually exclusive. I'm pretty firmly in the digital camp and am moving toward the server/client model like lots of others here, so my intent is to use my SD Transporter (which I don't own yet, but soon will!) for 99% of my listening, even the serious stuff. But I'll still keep a good CD transport around, if for no other reason than the fact that selecting a CD and dropping it in feels good, as another poster mentioned.

(BTW, I have lots of sources, analog and digital, and I intend to keep them all :-)
The high end transports sound better for two main reasons.
1. Higher end components than most hard drive computers.
2. We want them to because we spend so much money on them. If you get a high end DAC, hook both products up for processing and take a double blinded test I would nearly guarantee no ability to differentiate. MHO.
I had a Fully modded battery loaded SB and did a lot of tests against a Cd transport (Music Hall cd25) and the CD 25 was better eyes closed, eyes opened, sunglasses, etc... I then Changed the Music Hall for a CEC TL1 and Eventually for a Forsell transport...There is no comparison; Transports sound much better than SB.
Check this from a the www Lampizator dot eu site:

Digital cables conduct digital signal.
Not quite true. There is no digital signal in electricity. It is as analogue as it gets. zeros and ones come out of CD disk but after becoming electricity it is no longer a square wave 44 kHz but high frequency sine wave going out of transport to dac. It carries musical information mathematically embedded in this sine, but the cable conducts analog electrical wave form just like any other.
Knowing the physics of high frequency electricity, more like radio-wave propagation, we can have a good cable with matching electromagnetic impedance, low losses, low reflections, good screening, and minimal signal distortion. That makes this cable "good". But it is not "only digital" signal, and it is not that zeros and ones are zeros and ones, no matter what cable.

Lampizator site myths
Tonyptony, yes it was a serious question . . . thanks. I ask because I'm running my CEC TL-1X and my SB through an Audio Logic DAC and haven't done serious comparisons as yet. There's a good reason internet radio, like Pandora, or recordings, like from Rhapsody, don't sound as good as a transport . . . bit rate.
I'm curious, because of the recent discussion in one of the audio rags concluding that high-end servers sound better than transports.
Also, is the Transporter an advantage over the SB run through a high-end DAC?