Don- I am actually using one of those abortion cables(RCA on one end and XLR on the other-though I am planning big time cable upgrades come spring) with OK results, not great though. I am going to audition everything I can get my claws on soon, and hopefully find something that will work good. To tell you the truth I am a little disappointed with SACD, it isn't that much better and in fact not as good as super good redbook recordings. Compound that with the price, and the weird looks you get every time you try to buy them, to me it isn't worth it....yet. I bought a new(to me) Digital pre/DAC and am using the 9000es strictly as a transport for the time, though I am still thinking of having it upgraded(with out the balanced circuit of course), I am not using any analog outputs from the player hence NO sacd at the moment. The DAC(s) in my pre will walk all over the 9000es DAC(s) in the sony, I am not writing SACD off for good yet, just putting it on the back burner. FWIW there is a good abortion cable out there made by Pure Note in the Epsilon line, I was thinking about getting it then I got the new pre, and it has balanced and single ended outputs so I mind as well bypass the need of using adaptors or wacky cables. It is a well known fact that those RCA->XLR adaptors degrade the sound, so that would be an absolute last resort for me. BTW what cables are you running?
