Best SACD/CD player I can get for $5k new or used

A used Audio Aero capitole MKII with the latest P3 chip will be the most musical component you'll ever buy.
Trust me, I have one and am very glad I spent the money on a soon-to-be classic.
There are no more reliability problems and it plays MUSIC!
It is so ahead of the pack that it reminds me of the Marantz 10B tuner and Marantz 9 amplifiers of yore. They were excellent then and still sound better than most current stuff after 40 years.

Spend $1000 on a Denon 2900. Spend the other $4000 on top quality discs.

Eldartford has good advice. The transports in the newer players, such as the Denon 2900 and the Philips 963 are much better than the older ones. These have two lasers and with mods, can offer world-class performance.

One of the pro modders likes the Phillips 963sa better than the Marantz sa14 when both are modded.

Now that is saying something imho.

I have just posted under the Denon2900 thread. I got a Denon 2900 with a tube parafeed analog stage. They retail for $2995 and beat nearly everything I have heard. The Meitner is the exception, at least at this point in my comparisons. The Denon is not yet on their webpage exemplaraudio.com.