TRL 595-how good is it?

Jes45, That's impressive if you think it beat the Meitner. I'll look for the posts where you compare it with the TRL. I must admit that you have me very curious abot the player, and the only way I will ever really know is to hear it in my system. Reasonable people can hear the same components and come to different conclusions, but I find it hard to believe the TRL would be in the same league with Meitner, Exemplar, APL, etc. but it's certainly possible. There is really only 1 way to know.

I'm still shakin my head

I think the only way that a cheaper player with a cheaper mod can beat more expensive players and more expensive mods is if the design philosophy is different.

If you look at military fighter jets, the last generation of planes produced by the Soviet Union were frighteningly good, matching or outperforming U.S. aircraft (F15, F16) in many dimensions, yet cost a fraction of the price. Whereas U.S. aircraft were crammed with bleeding edge technology, the Soviet planes were more selective and placed more of an emphasis on optimization of older technology. This is not a perfect analogy but perhaps it helps to make a point.

I do not know how TRL does its mod. Paul's years of experience with studio recording technology and very expensive audio gear ($30k cd players, $100k tube amps, etc) suggests that he knows what great sound is like and also what goes into the most premium high end components. Has he found a way to optimize the sound of the little Sony 595/2000ES and the Marantz SA11/14 so that they compete with the all-out mods albeit with a less parts and labor intensive approach? The thinking would be that the Marantz SA11/14 in particular are flagship products and are backed by teams of qualified engineers - there must be many good things to the design that can sound much better with a few judicious tweaks. Is a 100% different output stage necessarily better? The same applies to other aspects of the mod. I don't have the answers, but this is the only way that a $595 mod can make sense.

The only ways to know for sure are to a) dissect the TRL mod, b) do more head-to-head comparisons of TRL modded players with similar ones from APL/Exemplar/Modwright/RAM/etc. Ideally, the TRL Marantz SA11/14 would be faced off vs the top players from the other modders since the Marantzes sounds better than the Sonys.

On my part, I have a Marantz SA14 that TRL is modding. I took a leap of faith. I have a good feeling that it will turn out well. I admit it would be even more comforting if there were more info on A and B above. My other personal view is that I am confident about the quality of APL products (which undertake a massive reengineering of the stock products) so I may give Alex a try as well.

True, almost everyone posts a glowing review. Ideally you listen before and after the mod. Before the mod, pick out what you dislike about the sound, write it down if you have to (esp since the mod + break-in takes so long and you can forget!). Otherwise, its easy to get caught up in what you already liked from the stock player once you start reviewing the modded player.

I've had a few surprises with digital. I expected my Cary 303 to kill a friend's nOrh CD-1 (in my system). It didn't! I got a NOS Amperex Orange Globe 6DJ8 to replace the more pedestrian Siemens 7308 but instead found that it sounded edgier and less smooth. Funny stuff.