2. digital
  3. 1378710855

Phillips no longer producing transports

Hi folks, as many of you are no doubt aware Phillips have decided to stop producing the Pro 2 LH transport used by ARC, Ayon, Vitus and others. What does this all mean? I'm informed by one manufacturer who I wont name that their stock of transports is good for another year or so of production whilst maintaining stock for warranty service. I'm told they are now moving toward designing a server to replace cd players in future. Esoteric are still manufacturing transports, and Accuphase have moved to a proprietory transport mechanism, so cd players will still be produce into the future. But for a powerhouse like Phillips to give up on cd transports is a harbinger, a sign of things to come and the likely phasing out of cd production. It is likely in future cd production will only continue in small runs of for audiophile labels and boutique producers, and high res downloads will continue to develop and become more mainstream. I think Bob Dylan said "The times they are a changin'".
melbguy1
rar1's avatar
rar1
1,784 posts
 
Not a big surprise ... right? There is no reason they can not do what Rega did with the Apollo and source their own transport mechanisms. There is always the re-purposed DVD mechanism route. Or there is my particular spin on this which is stockpiling new CD players which are being discontinued and sold off at a 50% or greater discount. I am 56 now and should be good for another 20 years or so. We'll see if I still give a hoot about all this 2033.

Rich
nonoise's avatar
nonoise
10,893 posts
 
When Valjoux decided to abandon the 7750 automatic movement and get with the digial watch craze, an engineer for Valjoux squirreled away the machinery for making them. It didn't take long for Valjoux to realize their mistake and the 7750 movement is still the workhorse for their line. They can't make enough of them and payment for that movement is made 6 to 12 months before any make receives the product, sometimes longer.

Thank goodness for that prescient engineer.

Crunching numbers for shareholders who can't see beyond the 1st quarter is common these days but hopefully, someone will see the value of putting away some nuts for the winter.

All the best,
Nonoise
jafant's avatar
jafant
19,798 posts
 
All great points Rich and Nonoise. This is the perfect time for those companies to step up and develop their own transports. CD/DVD/BR players are not going away, anytime soon!
melbguy1 OP
1,438 posts
 
Agreed Jafant, Rich and Nonoise made cogent points. I think the likely outcome is with cd sales declining, some manufacturers may go down the server route rather than tooling up to build their own transport and just see what happens in future. The larger players with more corporate funds may well build a proprietary transport mechanism or negotiate an OEM contract with someone like Esoteric. Of course doing so means designing around the new transport from scratch.

It is likely Phillips won't relinquish the patent for their Pro 2 transport, but unless cd sales increase which seems unlikely, Phillips for one are out of the transport-building business.

However as Rich eluded to, their are other transport options such as using a cd/dvd rom drive as used by Cary, Oppo/MSB etc. Boulder are doing something similar and use a very accurate cd/dvd rom drive sourced from the Supercomputer industry. Their 1021 network player is ideally placed for the future with a readily available/replaceable transport mechanism and the capability to stream over ethernet.

It will be interesting to see if shiny discs have a revival one day like vinyl!
More to discover