Bryston BCD-1 Player Owners

It would be good to try and understand what about the BCD-1 makes you feel it no longer matches your system?

If you still like the sound of the Bryston you have the option of acquiring a used BDA-1 which has dual Crystal dac chips in it over the single chip in the BCD-1. When I had a BDA-1 I thought it sounded better than my friend's BCD-1.

An alternate choice would be the recently released BDA-2 dac from Bryston. More functions and most importantly they have moved from the Crystal dac chips to AKM 32 bit chips so that "should" change the sound somewhat and may get you closer to the presentation you are looking for. Upside to the BDA-2 is it should drive the prices down on used BDA-1 units as is often the case when new models come out - again this will depend on whether or not you want to still use a Bryston digital product...

While there are different as opposed to "better" flavors out there in terms of digital pieces one man's better isn't necessarily better to someone else. That being said moving away from the BCD-1 to any DAC will change things for you in terms of sound, options, access to pc audio, hi-rez file playback, etc.

There are digital products out there that still use "older" chips with much success (sorry, can't think of one off hand) so the latest and greatest isn't always the answer when it comes to how you enjoy your music of choice.

I would imagine that there is now a lack of synergy within your system since the recent changes and the BCD-1 better matched your previous set-up. If you have trust in your local dealer and he hopefully allows home demos then take a few DACS home for a real-world trial - this will tell the true story. Probably cost you more in the end but will allow you to dial in the apparent missing synergy.