I was dead set on getting a NAD/Cambridge Audio/Denon etc CDP for around £225, but I've been reading that some folk think that a cheap transport and DAC will be better (or same performance for less) than a standalone CDP of the same price. Thoughts on this? I wouldn't know what transport or DAC to go for though.

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My normal listening rig is a $60 (30 quid) Philips DVD player and a $35 Entech 203.2 DAC and it sounds bloody marvellous to my humble ears, every bit as good as my $460 NAD C542 (since sold) in my humble opinion. Sadly the Entech is becoming harder to find than a Socialist in the Labour party...

Hmmm I wonder how many head-fiers are using set-ups like that. But why should a cheap transport and DAC be very close to the quality of a dedicated CDP thats double/triple the price?
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Harder than trying to stop them becoming Big Brother?

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Here is an extreme position, not one I necessarily wholly agree with but call it a stsrting point.

Physics is physics , engineering is engineering and specs are specs, a good design will perform to certain tolerances, the principles of extracting data from a CD are pretty mature now, even cheap transports can do it with error rates that are inconsequential. That part A costs 10x part B doesnt matter if they both perform to the same parameters. Jitter is at best a highly controversial topic.

If we take competent design as a given and error and jitter are disregarded what is left to worry about.

1) The post Digitization analog steps
2) A design deliberately altering the archetypal flat FR

Now given that even a $2.00 opamp can give a pretty flat response up to 20K, what else is left top worry about.

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why?.... you ask ... simply because high $$$ amount many times does not translate to proportionally high levels of sonic performance. "Performance-level" being a highly subjective and personal thing.

I am happy with my modded entech 205.2, and would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone on a tight budget.

There is also a certian point - say about $5000 - where everything preforms to a pretty high level and then consumers are really left to pick what character they perfer. I think kramers right though, this hobby really does suck because of diminishing returns! One will see a far greater difference going from a $99 dollar CDP to a $500, than from a $5,000 to a $50,000 CPD.

Once you get to the TEAC Esoteric CD clamping system, the CD preformance really does improve again. (A couple of campanies use their transports.)

Just remember to go coax with your set up. IMO, optical is a bit of a hoax if you ask me.

I too have gone the cheap transport + DAC approach. I use the Sony CE595 and run it thru my Zhaolu or Constantine DAC. To my ears it sounds incredible. I have heard NAD and Rotel CDPs and my setup sounded just as good to my ears. I have about 600 CDs, but listen to music on my computer most of the time. None of my CDs are on my computer and I don't want them there so I couldn't justify $500+ for a high-end CDP to play CDs that I really don't listen to very much...especially since I have already invested a lot of money in DACs.

I use a dvd player as a transport to my dac, would a cheap cd player as the transport offer a significant improvement?

Although, I do feel like upgrading to a dedicated cd player, I like the feeling of taking out a cd to listen to rather than browsing files on my pc

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A used Sony S7700 can be had for around 100 in ebay.. They are great transports.. Mine synergizes very well with my SA5000.. They sold for 1,400 in 99..Top notch build quality.

Older and used gear is economical way to get good performance.

I don't generally recommend transport + DAC combo if you are detail oriented.

Many people think that the 200 - 1000$ price range doesnt offer much improvement (until maybe the appolo) except better build quality, ergonomics and looks.

One of the cheap DACs (entech 203.2 or 205.2, Dac-ah, zhaolu (the various modifications might be worth it though), alien DAC and such) will probably sound as good as an entry-level CDP in your system, up to a few hundred dollars.

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Yeah.. I'm finding that out.. Get the old, good stuff..For cheap..

The Oppo brand of DVD players are said to be great as a transport, including the guy who designs great DACs and other gear (Dusty at Channel Islands Audio). The idea is that the transport/dac combo allows one to upgrade just the DAC part as one can afford better gear. With a standalone player, you get what you get unless you want to spend the extra money to modify. Jitter arises as a prime issue with a transport/dac vs. a standalone player which has less inherent jitter as the signal path is shorter and more direct.

The reason that a player is a lot more is that you are paying for all the engineering that goes into the thing from the transport mechanism, power supply layout, clock, dac, analog section, the case, the buttons, and controls, etc. However, it's also a fixed item that has limited upgrade potential and you know we all want to upgrade--sooner rather than later.

Splitting it up might actually yield more for your money if you catch the "upgraditis" bug.

OTOH, a transport, as a "platform", can then be the basis upon which one can continuously upgrade the source over time without completely getting new equipment. The main reason is that as technology improves semiconductor chips, the price/performance of a DAC gets better and better. You can keep your same old transport and get a totally different (hopefully better) sound with a new dac.

Right now, many people use their computer and swear by it as a superior transport vs. a DVD or cd player due to the negligible jitter from the USB signal. Given the amount of music that can be stored on mulit-gig hard drives, it makes for a strong case to just start with a computer if you don't already have a transport.

I'm about to start that given the the ability to manage all my music by genre, group, album, all through iTunes. When I'm on a rampage, I can just point and click rather than have dozens of cds and jewel cases strewn about the room after a night of smoking, drinking, and rocking. When you throw in the ability to upsample, EQ, and in general fiddle with your audio stream through software, the convenience and features of a computer-as-source blows away the old cd or DVD player platform. Too bad I'm too stubborn to really change over to it, but I'm as close as I've ever been.

Nice post stryker, I started with a computer setup with a nicely built Alien Dac not powered by the USB port but with a power supply tread, I had all sorts of problems with this setup, foobar wouldn't let me output bitperfect so I gave up sold the Dac and now I'm looking maybe to get some Nec Multispin units, mod the transport/coax out and than add a NOS dac like the upcoming Storm Pandora, 16 TDA1543 chips. A nice sub-1k source.

i was doing the whole computer thing for a good while - a year or so - as my main rig and where i spent almost all my time doing my listening sessions, but recently i have gone back to my stand alone cd player and, i have to say, things just sound better. i don't know why, but the music never sounds quite as good from the cpu.