Recommendations on CD Changers

[markl]

Splurge on the DVM3700, you will be glad you did. Audio quality is phenomenal, in my opinion, better than one the best CD changers made, the CAL CL10 (which was $1500 new, 50% more than the Denon).

The Denon DVM 3700 plays back HDCD recordings with incredible skill. You just got to hear it. It's worth it.

markl

[grrr223]

So, I can see how you want to keep your audio and video separate JMT, but are you losing any sound quality by getting the 3700? While you can buy a $150 DVD player, and you mentioned that you care more about the audio than the video, just going on the fact that if you are in this forum, you like quality in what you are listening to (watching), then you don't want a $150 DVD player, trust me.

At school, I live in a fraternity, and we have a 50-something inch Toshiba HDTV, good stuff, and after we bought it, we didn't have much money left for a decent source (well...aside from the DSS, which also doesn't look that great, the high resolution of the TV just amplifies it's shortcomings) so we bought a $199 Toschiba DVD player. Now, if you're watching a $2000+ TV with a DVD as the source, you should walk in and go WOW, trust me, that's not the case with this setup. I own a Pioneer Elite DV-05 THX certified DVD player which retailed for $1000, I got it as a wise buy at tweeter for $500, that makes you walk in and go wow when I hook it up to that TV. While those are two extremes, there are a lot of good DVD players in the price range above $150 and below $1000, such as the DENON 3700, I think you'd be getting a lot for your money with this changer...

That just leaves me to the question of How does it sound? Markl, you recomend the 3700 syaing it sounds great, bu thave you done an A/B with the 3700 and 370 side by side? I would like to have the DVD capabilities, but I don't want to give up ANY sound quality for it, anyone have any more input on that issue?

[morphsci]

for the DCM-370. I picked a used one up off of eBay for $130. It sounds very good. Sometime in August I will post a review of the Denon and my Rotel with the Cal Gamma Dac. I think thats a relevant comparison based upon street prices at this time. For the price I paid nothing can touch the price/performance ratio. For performance you may want to check out the Sony SCD-C333ES as suggested by Ian or the Denon DVD suggested by Markl. I auditioned the Denon DVD with my Creek and MS II's in the local dealers showroom. It did sound very good, probably better than the 370, but they didn't have a 370 for me to demo at the time (because they couldn't keep them in stock). I have not demoed the Sony because there is no dealer close by. I will probably buy it from Oade brothers new in September since they have a nice demo policy. Anyway, the Denon 370 is incredible bang for the buck.

[grrr223]

thanks a lot for the info. How much was the rotel? and which model is it? I need to investigate CD players a lot more, I think I'll look at NAD, Arcam, and Rotel, I almost want to buy one of them because I want to have a CD player that sounds better than any of my friends from a brand they've never heard of. Keeping audio esoteric if fun. But I guessI need to examine the price/performance ratio of the other brands. If nothign beats the Denon, then, I'll just get that, I'm not going to let my desire to be better than everyone get in teh way of good sound.

[morphsci]

The Rotel is an old single disc model, the RCD-855. I am using it as a transport to the CAL Gamma DAC. It was at the time a very smooth sounding player. However, recent advances have made it outdated. I like the sound out of it with the CAL Gamma very much and the CAL only cost $99 from the Sensory Science web site. For single disc players you may want to look at the Cambridge Audio D500se and the NAD C541. Both can be had for approx. $350 and both to me sound very good using my OBH-11/MS II demo system. My nod goes to the NAD but I could be happy with either.

[jeremymayf]

I wound up going with the scd-333-from oades. I never could find either a dvm-3700 or dcm370 to audition! The 333 has proven worthy, however. i auditioned it against a creek 43 mk2--which bested the sony--but not by much!

[MacDEF]

For what it's worth, Stereophile recently named the Sony 333 5-disc changer as a Class B Recommended Component! That's unheard of at that price (Introductory price was $1200, but you can get them brand new for <$600).