Marantz SA7S1 owners - stock or modded

I own an SA-7S1 and have heard several modded versions. All I can say is, just be careful. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with modding, and I support it in many cases, but IMO the Marantz 7 and 11 are such wonderfully balanced players that the wrong mods can actually hurt rather than help. The modded players I’ve heard definitely CHANGE the sound—no doubt about it—but whether that change is a good thing or not is open only to the listener. I personally didn’t care for any of the modded units, and I’m keeping mine stock until I hear a mod that unequivocally IMPROVES the sound in ALL parameters. Just my opinion, of course. YMMV.

I own a SA-7S1 I wouldn't modify it. Why don't you try a warm sounding IC ( gold has a nice full sound) and maybe a warm PC (Lessloss maybe) and see if that helps.

If not save your money and get a non upsampling tube dac.

I own a SA-7S1 for about 1 year.

IMO modding usually brings improvement but also changes in the sonic character. The pitfalls are that modding is not cheap & it's difficult to remove it if the change is not of your taste.

To furhter improve SA-7S1 's performance, why not consider utilizing its clock input ability? I purchased an used Apogee Big Ben external clock recently & the resulting sonic improvement is well worth the money spent.

Hooper, Just curious about what modded players & modders you're talking about, and what were the internal changes made. Did you hear them in a familiar system? IME there are some mods-- particularly improvements to power supplies-- that make decisive improvements in every way. Other changes may be more subjective.

i'm surprised that no one has tried to add a tube buffer stage to the marantz.

i am breaking in the 11s2. it sounds very good with nmy fisher 400. i suspect the player needs a very euphonic preamp/amp combination to avoaid an over-focused presentation.