Changer

Get the newest used Harman Kardon changer you can find. Their website www.youcanfindityourself.com sells factory reconditioned units. She'll love it.

The way to go is a refurb sony 595, often available on SonyStyle for $60. What have you got to lose? Just money as the sound equals $1K rigs. It does SACD too.

It sounds like you are searching for variable outputs, if I read your post right. The only recent changers I know of that have this are some of the Sony ES units, the 333, 555, maybe even the 222.
I had a college roommate who had a Sony ES changer with variable output, we're still friends and he still has it in his main system! That should speak to build quality, we graduated in '96...

OK I misspoke, the C222ES, C333ES, and C555ES do not have variable outputs, per the manuals on the Sony site. I did a not-so-quick search and found that the CDP-C87ES and CDP-CA9ES units do have variable outputs. I'd stick with an ES unit if you buy a Sony. There is a CA9 on sale on this site RIGHT NOW:
http://www.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?dgtlplay&1329018251&/Sony-CA9ES-CD-Changer
but there is a sale pending...

if you want to save some dough, the denon dcm380 has a (remote accessible) variable out and actually sounds very good. not exactly a paragon of build quality, but you can find 'em real cheap on ebay. the older sony c70es (in addition to the models cited by remo) also does the trick and is also available for less than a hundo.