Is Sony SCD-1 still worth to possess?

The unmodified unit is great. On redbook, I think it competes with the wadia 850 and the resolution audio cd-50. The wadia has a cleaner sounding analogue stage.

I own the scd-1 w/kern mods, and am not looking for anything else now. The combination of one box convenience, build quality, and sonics are what do it for me.

The Kern audiocom mod transforms it to one of the best cd players I've heard. It's now in the same general league as the $7000 Audio Aero Capitol 24/192 mk I, the tube output Modwright XA777, and the $12,000 dcs 192 combo. My player originally had the kern parts upgrade (around 850), and I heard it back to back with the audi aero. I thought the aero was better on redbook due to it's tube output stage and built in 192 upsampling. It was more analog sounding. The $350 superclock mod made an enourmous improvement in the scd-1. I would guess they are now about equal - or so close you shouldn't care.

If you have multiple digital sources, then a transport/dac approach might make more sense.

Richard Kern can be found at www.audiomod.com
Dan Wright is at www.modwright.com.

Both guys do audiocom (an english company that makes the upgrades) installs, and some additional specialty stuff.

I've met both of these guys and had both of their players stomped my stock scd-1 into the ground in direct A to B tests in my system. The mods work and they are not subtle improvements. I recommend both of them equally as people whom I would trust to do the work. They are both very professional (and smart [yikes!]) people.

My player already had some kern mods done to it when I bought it, so having Richard continue with more upgrades made the most sense.

I'm listening to Art Pepper's 'the way it was' on my hot-rod scd-1 now! Superbe et Sublime! Thanks Art! Thanks Richard!

I heard it in my home - Dan brought it over. I only heard it side by side with my stock SCD-1. His tube stage XA77ES was much much better than my stock scd-1. No comparison really. I can't really say if the kern scd-1 was better or worse than the modwright tube player. They are quite different. One has tube warmth, the other has solid state resolution.

I'm happy to offer up my system for a shootout. I doubt it would be conclusive given the tube vs solid state sound of each unit.

I have heard the same thing about the balanced outputs. I know that my modified sony was 'optimized' for balanced output during the upgrade - not sure what that means. I know my modified unit sounds much better on balanced than single ended. The stock unit had roughly the same sound quality on balanced vs single ended.