Which makes more sense? - CD player vs SACD

I second Cmalak on the Marantz SA8004. It sounds excellent for SACD, CD, and streaming Logitech Touch FLAC. It is the digital swiss army knife. I have found no shortcomings with it sonically speaking. I can't wait until I can get a chance to listen more! I have not felt that way about my system in a long long time.

I have about 40 SACD's for now. I was in to the music sever thing for a long time...never seemed right to me, despite several dacs, mac mini, etc...just way to much fussing around. I still use the touch but SACD and redbook sounds so right I can't pull myself away.

sACD is not moribund. I have been buying quite a few classical and jazz pieces, and there is rock available. I find the sacd layer to be superior to or equal to the cd layer on hybrid disks, and many high end dealers will use sacd or hi rez digital for demos.

As for vinyl you will have to pay several times the price of the marantz or oppo unit that have been reccomended. I find it hard to justify both sources if you are just getting back into this hobby. For the 5g's plus you will spend on a TT, arm, cartridge and phono pre, you can buy a lot of music!

check out oppo bdp 95; best of both, even three worlds if you would integrate blueray/

Personally, I think you should scrap the cd and sacd thing and go with your choice of music server and DAC. This can certainly sound better than redbook cd from all but the most expensive players, and you can't beat the convenience and fun factor. Not to mention that it is the future of what we do.

Shakey

There are a lot of good ideas here already. I'll throw a few more in the pot.

Look for the Virtue Audio Piano M1 for CD only. It's definitely in your price range, looks great and sounds great.

For SACD, There are plenty of good suggestion already. I'll suggest getting a used Denon 3910. They were ~$1500 new, but can be had used for $200-300. Then you'd have a huge chunk of change left over to spend on music. I think they compare well to Oppo/Marantz suggestions.

Also, there is a here on Audiogon who is selling a modded Denon 3910 that could conceivably be better than any of these, and I think he's asking about $800. I'm not sure if he's still selling it, but the 3910 mods are generally wonderful. I think he's also throwing in a bunch of SACD's.