I was on an Oppo list and scheduled to receive a 205 4/28, then I decided to wait for a silver 205. An email from Oppo informed me that there had been little demand for silver 105s, and it's not clear that Oppo will offer a silver 205. So yesterday I reordered a 205. I was surprised to receive notification from FedEx that delivery is scheduled for 4/28, my birthday.
The 205 will be a black thorn among silver Ayre 5-series components and a Sony HAP-Z1ES.
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milpai, I will try to do so, but the other player in that system is an Ayre C-5xeMP, a high bar. The preamp is an Ayre K-5xeMP, the amp a VX-5 Twenty. The balanced Ayre audio chain seems to have some magic, but I have high hopes for the 205.
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I use a 4K Sony 65 XBR 850 as a monitor in the setup in which the 205 will replace a 105. In anticipation, I bought a couple of 4K movies a couple of months ago. But having taken a peek at 4K using Fire TV, I'm not sure I'll perceive much improvement over the already excellent 1080p -- or it may be that the Sony upscales everything to 4K.
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I played Blu-reys of Legends of Jazz and the 2nd movement of Beethoven's 7th using the 105 then the 205. The 205 provided more of a sense of transparency than the 105, the mids in particular seeming more open. It's a sound I could live with easily.
I played Waltz for Debby SACD, a CD of Corelli concertos, and DVD-A of Pet Sounds using the Ayre C-5exMP and 205. The 205 closes the gap with the Ayre substantially compared to the 105, but doesn't match its sense of transparency nor its depth of sound stage. The 205 doesn't quite get to that intangible sense of listening to music that's just there, i.e., not being reproduced. The big surprise was Pet Sounds. Played with the Ayre it has an amazing sense of depth, but seemed flat with the 205. I tried the video side of the disc with no improvement in sound but a display of lyrics for those who like to sing along.
The 205 is a very nice sounding disc player that lacks the magic of the Ayre. It is a substantial improvement over the 105. Of course I can't play Blu-rey discs on the Ayre, but the sound of Blue-reys using the 205 is so good I needn't look elsewhere. Fortunately, that's the purpose of the Oppos in my setups. |
milpai, before I moved the Ayre C-5xeMP to the living room, it had been the stereo player along with an Esoteric SA-60 for surround in the HT/music room. They both used a Parasound JC 2 BP preamp and JC 1 monoblocks driving a pair of KEF Reference 107/2s. But when I play stereo using the SA-60 -- its now the only alternate to a silver 105D, it gets very close but doesn't quite reach that uncanny sense of music just being there the Ayre provides. Nothing in my previous post should denigrate the 205. It's an excellent CD/SACD and superb Blu-ray player.
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I've been surprised that I can appreciate UHD from Fire TV and a Blu-ray even on the relatively small screen of a 65 XBR 850. I'll buy a few more UHD Blu-rays if I can find anything of interest, and I'll move the unused Apple TV to the living room. The UHD compatible HDMI switch seems to function as advertised. A remote lets you select one of three inputs and one of two outputs. IIRC, it was only about $50!
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If the connection is HDMI, the Classe is doing the DAC for either player. I'm surprised you would observes such a difference.
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I recently connected the 205 to the Ayre K-5xeMP via balanced analog. The sound is now very close to that of the Ayre C-5xeMP, i.e., superb stereo. For this particular pairing, balanced makes a difference despite Oppo's claim that XLR and RCA outputs should sound identical. Ayre emphasizes fully balanced and zero feedback design, so my experience may not generalize to preamps or processors of other manufacturers.
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Ozzy,
I realize it's off-topic, but how do you like the 85" UHD Samsung?
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I have DirecTV and FireTV connected via HDMI to a 205 through a switch, and balanced analog from the 205 to a preamp. I get the audio dropouts with DirecTV but not FireTV.
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Ozzy,
How do you use the 205 to record hi-rez audio from Blu-ray concerts to an external hard drive?
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I've been using my 105, because of annoying audio problems using the 205 with DirecTV that don't occur with the 105. Having learned about the firmware update, I reinstalled the 205 and updated it. The annoying problems appear to have been fixed in the update.
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