Looking to improve CD playback

I'm just saying not to underestimate the role of the transport.
I also like the idea of controlling your variables and changing only one variable at a time. I know from experience just how good the BDA-1 is.  My suspicion is that when it comes to spinning discs, that your transport is currently the weaker link in your chain.  All things being equal,  DVD transports tend to introduce more jitter than dedicated Redbook CD transports. That is why so many high-end players are limited to doing Redbook CD only.  In my personal experience, the uptick in SQ feeding the BDA-1 from the BCD-1 was no where near as great as the SQ differential the BCD-1by itself had over the Denon 2910 / BDA-1 combo.

mesch,
I have a BDA-1, and it is a fine DAC (I now have mine in my second system).  I also have a Bryston BCD-1 CD player.  Some years ago before I got into streaming, at the same time that I auditioned the BCD-1, I also auditioned the BDA-1.  Both at the dealer and and with a borrowed BDA-1, I experimented with a number of  lesser CD players and DVD players, including my own Denon 2910 DVD/SACD universal player hooked up to the BDA-1. It was no contest, even thought the BDA-1 was the technically superior DAC to the similar DAC built into the BCD-1, in terms of SQ, the BCD-1 just simply outperformed any of the combos I compared it to.  I came into the shop thinking about buying a good DAC, but wound up buying the BCD-1 instead.  When it came to spinning plain vanilla Redbook CD's the BCD-1 with it's rock solid Redbook CD only transport was the clear winner.  So the transport really matters.  A couple years later after Bluesound integrated streaming from Tidal I picked up both an original Bluesound Node and a BDA-1 to go with it.  It was and still is a very good combo, but couldn't quite match the BCD-1.  It was only after I started using a Melco N1A as my NAS (effectively as my CD transport) that I was able to approach the BCD-1 level of performance.   

unsound,
nothing at all shabby about the sound direct from those Arcam players, or even from my old Denon 2910 ... but it's all relative ... and as with everything in this wonderful and sometimes crazy hobby ... everything matters as you move up the SQ food/supply chain.