A phenomenal new CD transport-Pro-Ject CD Box RS2 transport


I have had in-house for the last week Pro-Ject's new CD Box RS2 transport to review for the website Stereo Times. I was very curious to assess its performance because it uses the Pro 8 drive with the Blue Tiger CD-84 servo card. This drive was developed and built by StreamUnlimited a company started by the original Phillips designers that historically built the finest CD mechanisms. Only two other companies use the StreamUnlimited 8 drive and Blue Tiger CD-84 servo card, their pieces cost $16,000 and $39,000 compared to Pro-Ject's sane price of $3,000!

My reference for the last two years has been the excellent Jay's Audio MK-II transport that had out-performed much more expensive highly regarded transports in my system. Well, across every sonic parameter  (transparency/micro-details-overall dynamics/bottom-end extension/purity of tonality- a much more airy sound-stage with wonderful 3D imaging) compared to the Jay's Audio transport.

That's way I titled this thread a "phenomenal new CD transport" because while not inexpensive, it just might be a bargain based on its performance. Mind you, this superlative level of performance is based on using the switching power supply that Pro-Ject ships the transport with. I have shortly coming a custom 20 watt 3 amp linear power supply from Linear Tube Audio and Pro-Ject's own upgraded power supply to see if the RS2 transport performance will even go to a higher qualitative level of performance.

I'll be writing a full detailed review for Stereo Times in the near future. However, I wanted to share this information to GON members who still spin CDs. I have had numerous CD transports in for evaluation and this just might be the best sounding of all of them.

Teajay (Terry London)




amorstereo

Showing 4 responses by jaudio1

I just read a post on another forum complaining about excessive noise coming from some of these pro-ject rs2 transports. For the people that own them can you comment if you have heard any excessive noise when spinning disc’s ? 
Hey Tejay...have you compared the Pro-Ject with the updated Jays cd2 mk3 version with the better clock and other upgrades yet ? 
I recently picked up the RS2 T and compared it to both ripped AIFF files stored on my Aurender N100H and also streaming Qobuz from the same Aurender.  The RS2 gives a noticeable increase in soundstage depth, transparency, and fine details.  Horns seem to sound more real with less edge when compared ripped files or Qobuz. It's almost like a fine veil being lifted from in front of your speakers.  This is all with the wall wart power supply.  From what I hear I will get even better results by getting the linear power supply from LTA or Pro-Ject.  So to be clear

Pro-Ject RS2 T > Aurender N100H playing stored ripped files > Aurender N100H streaming Qobuz.

  

Since this Pro-Ject RS2 Transport is so incredibly good...it has me thinking that I need to try the matching DAC.  Has anybody here heard the Pro-Ject Prebox RS2 DAC ?  Personally I am not a big fan of sabre based dacs but considering the project dac has 4 6922 tubes that can be engaged using the remote plus various filters it has me curious to try it out.  It's the only dac that you can connect via the transports IS2 connection.  If anybody here has heard this combo please chime in and give us your thoughts.