Shanling T300

[Edwood]

Nice.

Let us know when the mothership has landed, Wayne.

-Ed

 

[dannyandelyse]

Wayne,
Tom and Aaron have decided to take an extended scuba dive starting on Long Island down the entire east coast with a final destination around the Caymans. I have voluntered to babysit and guard their headphone stuff. Hope they bring enough air......I would hate to incoporate both systems into mine....not enough AC outlets on that wall!
Gonna sound great as it looks, enjoy.
Dan

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dannyandelyse Wayne, Tom and Aaron have decided to take an extended scuba dive starting on Long Island down the entire east coast with a final destination around the Caymans. I have voluntered to babysit and guard their headphone stuff. Hope they bring enough air......I would hate to incoporate both systems into mine....not enough AC outlets on that wall! Gonna sound great as it looks, enjoy. Dan

Aaron definitely won't come up for air! He and his wife can dive, dive, dive, for a week straight. Hopefully, I'll have lots of head-fi visitors when we get this meet together. gsferrari is supposed to be working on it, but has gone quiet (not like him at all). It should be some time late this summer in case you're interested.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Edwood Nice. Let us know when the mothership has landed, Wayne. -Ed

Will do, Ed. You should come to Cayman too!

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by immtbiker It says SACD/CD player 4 different times in the catalog. Perhaps a phone call needs to be generated on Monday morning.

I'm thinking a phone call to Audio Advisor is definitely in order.

I've been looking at the T300 pics they have on their website (which are pretty cool with the proZOOM viewer) trying to figure out whether it's an SACD/CD player or CD only. Let's play Sherlock Holmes with all of the conflicting clues:

* The pic of the remote control shows that is has an SACD button in addition to a CD button. SCORE: SACD 1, CD-ONLY 0

* But the remote control also has DVD, TAPE, TUNER and AUX buttons, none of which are features that the T300 itself offers. SCORE: SACD 1, CD-ONLY 1

* The T300 itself does not appear to have a SACD/CD toggle button in any of the pics, whereas the T200 does. SCORE, SACD 1, CD-ONLY 2

* The inscription at the bottom of the LED display reads "Tube Stereo Compact Disk Player CD-T300" which is similar to the description on my T100 (Shanling's CD only player). My T200 player says "Stereo Tube Super Audio CD Player SCD-T200." SCORE SACD 1, CD-ONLY 3

* The pic of the back of the player reads, Model: CD-T300 (not SCD).
SCORE: SACD 1, CD-ONLY 4

* But, this same pic shows the serial number as, SL-001, indicating that it was the first prototype made, and perhaps the SACD feature has since been added. SCORE: SACD 2, CD-ONLY 4

* In the front view pic, the disc that is playing is an SACD demo disk! You can see the SACD logo as well as some of the wording, and the LED display shows 12 05:08 indicating that it's actually playing the disc. The T100 will not read an SACD, and shows an error that says "No Disc" if you were to try this. But then maybe the SACD demo disc has a redbook layer? Hummmm... on balance this is definitely a point for Team SACD.
SCORE: SACD 3, CD-ONLY 4

* The product SKU # for Audio Advisor is MHSHANSCD-T300.
SCORE: SACD 4, CD-ONLY 4

* Per Aaron, the Audio Advisor description was changed to SACD/CD in 4 places where it had read CD previously. SCORE: SACD 5, CD-ONLY 4

* So far, per a Google search, Audio Advisor seems to be the only company that is referring to is as a SACD player. SCORE: SACD 5, CD-ONLY 5.

It's a dead tie. I think I'll call Music Hall instead of Audio Advisor. They're the only US distributor and actually have the T300 in stock (and this is where my player will be coming from). I'm keeping my fingers crossed... why did I get this news in the middle of the night when all I can do is speculate?!?!?

 

[bln]

At least you thought it was a CD player when you bought it, and might now get SACD capability as a bonus almost. If it had been the other way around, and you were surprised to learn it didn't play SACD, you'd probably be very angry instead of just curious. Enjoy it, in any case.

 

[Wmcmanus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bln At least you thought it was a CD player when you bought it, and might now get SACD capability as a bonus almost. If it had been the other way around, and you were surprised to learn it didn't play SACD, you'd probably be very angry instead of just curious. Enjoy it, in any case.

This is exactly my train of thought, and since I'll have the T200 in the same room, I'm covered as far as SACD goes anyway. It's exciting to think that maybe I'll be getting more than I bargained for, and could set up an SACD system in another room. My gut feeling is that Audio Advisor has made a mistake, but I hope I'm wrong.

 

[tom hankins]

When you read the AA website info of the features of the T300 it says nothing about SACD. It only mentions all the redbook features.

 

[Wmcmanus]

I've just called Audio Advisor, and was told that they made a mistake in their catalog and weren't able to fix it in time before it went out. It is definitely a CD only player (insert a sad face icon here that I don't even have the heart to click on right now). Oh well.

The good news (and at this point I'll simply chalk it up to sales fluff) is that I was also told that "It's the best sounding CD player I've ever hreard, and I've heard literally hundreds of top performers. It really does look as good as it sounds." But this was from a guy who I don't know and have no basis from which to judge his credibility. When I pressed a bit about why he felt so strongly about it, he started telling me about the T300's features. Stuff I could read about for myself from the published specs.

But in any case, this sure was encouraging news. I didn't want to press further since I've already ordered my T300 elsewhere. I didn't want to waste the guy's time with questions that made it look like I was a 'serious' customer. That, and the only ears that really matter are my own, and I'll have my go at it soon enough! Yet, if I lived anywhere near Kentwood, MI, there is no doubt that I'd be making a bee line to Audio Advisor to give it an audition.

 

[immtbiker]

AA might not even have them in house...they are probably middle-maning them at that price. Them and the Daily News have made costly mistakes...getting people's hopes up!

 

[Zanth]

"It really does look as good as it sounds."

Some may say that it then sounds like crap

I would not be one of them...I like the looks, just not as much at the more understated CD T100 or T200. That said, perhaps it looks better in life as all the Shanlings seem to.

Too bad about the SACD feature, I'm still just crazy excited about reading how it stacks up to your T100 and T200 (the 200 is modded right?) If the T300 sounds better than the T200 playing SACD, we have a winner!