SACD Players

I agree with Rcprince, Sony is lowering the price and adding DVD to help force the format to the masses. They,and Phillips, stand to make a lot more money if this format wins the war. I have the 9000es and think it was a great deal.

Linamine. You ask two entirely different questions. one is subjective: "How they play DVD". My answer is to push button with word "PLAY". Now, your question "How $1,200 Player sounds better then $3,500 (and I would add $5000 as well) is more difficult to answer. I will split my answer for you on two. Firstly, I stated that I am biased, it is highly biased opinion. How I developed this opinion? I don't like to compare one piece of equipment with another. I (try to) comapare it with live acoustic music. I spend 12 years on music education (piano) and I am lucky to live in Philadelphia where sound (and importanly, ambience) of Academy of Music is easily reacignisible on many records made there. The latest, among many, is "Nature" by Waterlilly in 24/96, Red Book CD and SACD. I described in the previous post my system and you can, therefore, judge for yourself of its degree of fidelity to acoustic music (Many people demend fidelity to the actual recording which for me is one of many steps of reproduction of acoustic music. Unfortunatelly, I do not listen to electronic music and thus cannot comment to it. In summary, for my ears, in my system, in my acoustic environment I firmly (but dubjectively) believe (as of today not three years from now)that SACD sound is the best among, CDs, DVD-A, Vinil etc. I listen to Sony SC-1, owned 777ES and again I believe that sound of 9000ES is much superior. Non-biased, professional answer. According to Scatt Hall of Electraglide and few others th transport in 9000ES is much better then in previous SACD units, others suggest that its D/A chip is of second generation. I am out of this discussion, sorry, guys, for the lenght - Simon

You might check out Michael Gindi's review in the Winter issue of Ultimate Audio where he and Lars Fredell compared the Sony SCD-1 and the new Marantz SA-1 SACD/CD players.

Anyone know if the 9000ES has Redbook CD digital out? Not clear from the literature I saw.

If I might respectfully disagree with Simon: 1. History has taught us that the best product a company like Sony makes is in general, their first, flagship, product. After that, it's how can can the product be made more cheaply. 2. This is a fact: the combi drives out there today as used in the Sony are no where near the equal of the best drives available or the SCD-1 drive. The leading designers who have tried the new "universal" drives all tell me they are sadly lacking in quality. Then look inside the SCD-1 and check out the build quality, transport isolation and case -- and compare that with the 9000ES. 3. I'm wondering how the 9000ES, which converts DSD to PCM in the course of processing, can be better than the SCD-1? 4. The WL PO is THE worst CD Kavi has ever made. 5. Since you don't detail your vinyl system, it's hard to tell your reference point but the SCD-1 does not equal my TNT V/JMW-12.5 and either Parnassus DCt or Clearaudio Discovery. The only area where the the SACD player comes close is in low frequency dynamics -- but it still falls down when it comes timbre eg. listen to a piano and how all the low frequency registers sound the same. The SCD-1 is clearly bested in the most critical midrange area where it's still lean and lacking in three dimensionality.