Quest for the Best - High End CD Player

[tmarshl]

For some time I have been using a McIntosh Labs MS300 music server (OEMed from Escient) as my source. The good news is that it holds a lot of CDs and makes them readily accessible through a great interface. The bad news is that the hard drive seems to run a lot and is noisy, and the sound quality even with lossless FLAC is not perfect. Like many of you, I am always looking for perfect reproduction. The McIntosh Labs MS300 is great for casual listening, but I wanted a player for critial listening as well.

My initial research informs me that the high-end of digital playback:

1. Has almost no limit in price
2. Redbook CD is the overwhelming standard - around for 24 years
3. DSD (SACD) is much higher resolution, but with limited availability
4. DVD-A seems to be dying out

So I decided that I wanted a player that played SACD, but was also really spectacular on Redbook CD Audio, as I have hundreds of discs in this format already. Here is where I stand so far:

My target list included the following one-box players with balanced outputs:

1. Esoteric X-03
2. Cary CD 306 SACD
3. Wadia 581
4. Ayre 5-XE
5. EMM Labs CDSA SE

I decided not to buy a player that I could not audition:

I have been unable to audition an Esoteric X-03, but it is also off the list because I found that they are converting DSD (SACD) to PCM prior to digital to analog conversion. That just doesn’t cut it for me. This is probably the “budget” version in their product lineup, so they have crippled it to encourage you to buy the more expensive versions.

I have also been unable to audition a Cary CD 306 SACD. This model was interesting to me because it has completely separate digital circuitry for DSD (SACD) and PCM and uses 8 DAC chips (four for each format) to do the D to A conversion. I can’t imagine why anyone would spend this much money without even auditioning the equipment. The Cary is also off the list for this reason.

I also decided not to buy a player from a company in shaky financial status.

I have spoken with people who have some knowledge about Wadia, and they have advised me that it is still in a difficult financial position, and have had a lot of turnover in management. Although they seem to make great gear, I need to feel comfortable that the company will be around.

I received an Ayre 5-XE on Thursday and was blown away by the fit and finish of this CD Player. It sounded terrific, very smooth and open, an apparent contender.

But on Friday, I received an EMM Labs CDSA SE CD Player and the contest was over. It was the hands-down winner in Redbook playback – very dynamic, open, musical, and transparent. I borrowed some SACD discs and tried them out on the EMM Labs CDSA SE and they were terrific. The amazing thing is that the Redbook playback on this unit is almost as good as the DSD (SACD) playback. This is good news for me, as I have about six hundred audio CDs and I am confident that they will all sound their best on the EMM Labs CDSA SE.

The bad news is that the EMM Labs is substantially more expensive than the Ayre 5-XE, the Cary CD 306 SACD, or the Esoteric X-03.

Minor gripes about the EMM Labs CDSA SE are that the transport drawer is a bit cheesy for such an expensive player, and it takes a long time between pushing the play button and sound coming out of the speakers. But when it does eventually come out, it is glorious!

Those are my impressions so far. I would appreciate any thoughts or suggestions that you might have to aid me in my quest.

 

[vilg]

Hello there,
I think you should consider the Nova Physics Memory player (some info Here) along with the APL NWO 2.5T. The latter won a shootout some time ago where the EMM labs combo also participated. Details can be found Here.
I think I remember reading that head-fi member neilvg is getting the APL player, so perhaps he will chime in and tell more about it.

 

[Roam]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tmarshl /img/forum/go_quote.gif I have been unable to audition an Esoteric X-03, but it is also off the list because I found that they are converting DSD (SACD) to PCM prior to digital to analog conversion. That just doesn’t cut it for me.

This is actually the correct way to do it from a noise & RFI standpoint, DSD is just a fancy name for a single-bit delta-sigma datastream, or to put in cruder words, a switchmode signal. Think of all the noise a switchmode power supply can couple into the rest of the circuitry, this is 10X worse as you are creating the noise in the circuitry itself. This ignores all the headaches of filtering, noise-shaping, and reassembling the DSD into an analog output. It is not a trivial task. In short, you want to convert DSD into something less damaging from a noise standpoint as soon as possible before the signal has a chance to contaminate everything else with noise & RFI. DSD is a very noisy system, and in my opinion, it's a heavily flawed system. There's a reason only the cheapest CD players use single-bit delta-sigma DACs, which is essentially what DSD is.

 

[Akathriel]

I'm surprised that you're willing to buy a product from Esoteric but not from Wadia. Teac is Teac, no?

Obviously auditioning is the best way to tell but you should at least try the Cary and the Wadia because (from my personal experience with the house sounds of these companies, haven't heard all the players) the Cary and Wadia will have a lusher sound, while the Meitner, Esoteric, and Ayre are a bit more analytical. While it seems that a lot of people love Meitners, you owe it to yourself to try one of the other players, especially with such a a dry detailed system.

 

[tmarshl]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vilg /img/forum/go_quote.gif Hello there, I think you should consider the Nova Physics Memory player (some info Here) along with the APL NWO 2.5T. The latter won a shootout some time ago where the EMM labs combo also participated. Details can be found Here. I think I remember reading that head-fi member neilvg is getting the APL player, so perhaps he will chime in and tell more about it.

Thanks for your suggestions. I will look into them, althought I think that these great players may be outside of my budget constraints at present.

 

[tmarshl]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Akathriel /img/forum/go_quote.gif I'm surprised that you're willing to buy a product from Esoteric but not from Wadia. Teac is Teac, no? Obviously auditioning is the best way to tell but you should at least try the Cary and the Wadia because (from my personal experience with the house sounds of these companies, haven't heard all the players) the Cary and Wadia will have a lusher sound, while the Meitner, Esoteric, and Ayre are a bit more analytical. While it seems that a lot of people love Meitners, you owe it to yourself to try one of the other players, especially with such a a dry detailed system.

Esoteric may be owned by TEAC but it seems to have its own very high standards of quality.

Unfortunately, the Cary rep was not willing to send me a CDP for audition and I live in an area where there are few audio dealers (Santa Fe, NM). There is no way that I will again buy a piece of equipment without first auditioning it in my system. For the prices that they charge, along with my willingness to pay for the shipping, they should make a demo unit available IMHO.

 

[Akathriel]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tmarshl /img/forum/go_quote.gif Esoteric may be owned by TEAC but it seems to have its own very high standards of quality.

No my point was, that your reluctance to buy a Wadia product due to instability seems unfounded to me, but I may not be as knowledgable as you are. Teac is a megacorporation.

Too bad about Cary. You could try finding a nearby audiophile to audition with on Audio Asylum or something. The Wadia sound is very different from the other ones you've tried, and until you try something like Wadia or Accuphase, I don't think you've done enough research to make a decision.

 

[Sherwood]

I've read some truly excellent reviews of the Nova Physics piece as well, but since it's only a transport I don't believe it can process DSD SACD's. If you haven't yet built your collection of SACD's, though, you owe it to yourself to try redbook through the Nova Physics.

 

[Akathriel]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sherwood /img/forum/go_quote.gif I've read some truly excellent reviews of the Nova Physics piece as well, but since it's only a transport I don't believe it can process DSD SACD's. If you haven't yet built your collection of SACD's, though, you owe it to yourself to try redbook through the Nova Physics.

Hmm, Id be curious to know. The Nova Phsyics Player has a 32 bit dac in the 10k version with a very nice looking balanced triode output stage. I dunno if its DSD or DSD->PCM though. But it potentially supports all formats up to BluRay/HDDVD. I honestly don't think you should put even the slightest weight on the technology behind the player, especially if you're going to audition them all anyways. Pick the one that SOUNDS the best. But I guess I'm a hedonist. Also it sounds like 10k is a little bit more than he wants to spend.

 

[PFKMan23]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tmarshl /img/forum/go_quote.gif For the prices that they charge, along with my willingness to pay for the shipping, they should make a demo unit available IMHO.

Did you mention to them that you'd be willing to give them your credit card info?

 

[Sleestack]

The Esoteric X-03 and X-01 are older Esoteric designs and use the DSD-> PCM conversion. That doesn't necessarily mean all the newer products sound better. I'd rather have a DV-50 than a DV-60. Nevertheless, the DAC in my Esoteric P-03/D-03 allow both DSD-> PCM and PCM-> DSD conversion to be used or bypassed. It is my favorite source for both Redbook and SACD.

 

[chesebert]

one thing with Ayre is that any future upgrades are very cheap and Ayre will pretty much fix anything with an Ayre name on there for a small fee, even out of warranty.

 

[Icarium]

Very interested in hearing why dv50 over dv60... these are pretty much the two sources I am looking at. I don't know anything about the sound of a dv60, but I do know that the dv50s sounds AMAZING. I figured the dv60 would at least have the same quality of sound if not better due to it being an update? However, if this is not the case then you will have saved me money

Edit: I got so excited by this comparison that I hit him a PM and posted here ;p He answered that basically the dv60 has some plastic parts while the dv50 is a tank. Very compelling argument for me and I think I am swayed. Tank-like properties are extremely important to me and I think in general for a transport. I was just greedy and wanted the 1080p/hdmi of the dv60... but it probably makes sense to pursue those features on a separate unit (Sleestack suggested Denon) maybe one that is bluray capable.

 

[gaijin]

How about this baby ?

http://show.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/psm...agraaudio&home

It is on the cover of this month's stereophile. I would love to audition one. No SACD though (as this is one of your criteria).

 

[Akathriel]

Quote:

Originally Posted by gaijin /img/forum/go_quote.gif How about this baby ? http://show.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/psm...agraaudio&home It is on the cover of this month's stereophile. I would love to audition one. No SACD though (as this is one of your criteria).

Well without SACD as a criterion I could add 10 players off the top of my head. But I think he has a pretty well thought out list for his budget, and features.