I have read that the AR CD and Amp are not a good match for each other. I owned the AR Complete CD for a short while and it sounded very musical without an edge when paired to my Musical Fidelity X amp. In that price range why not get the Musical Fidelity A3 player from Audio Advisor for $1000.00. If you don't like it you can return it and will just be out the shipping. It has great pro reviews and the reports from owners are good as well.
Shopping CD players: my big adventure
The Parasound 1000 was getting old and my new Kestrels were a big leap over the Superone's. Got an Msb III and that was a good upgrade but I was sure there was more. Read all the threads here and Audio Asylum and decided to take a drive; 75 miles to the closest dealer. Listened to the Audio Refinement Complete player through ARP integrated and JM Lab ($1700 model, didn't get name). Sounded like a boombox! I says to the guy, "guy, thats a metal tweeter, right?" Guy says yes. I says, "you got anything in silk or linen, or possibly taffeta?" We rotate 90 and face a pair of Maggie 1.6r, still the Complete integrated, etc. Now Baez (I like to use acoustic female vocal although her politics suck) sounds like Baez instead of Roseanne Rosannadanna. Trumpets on Capriccio Italien (Mercury re-issue) sound like trumpets. Maggies are NICE except for imaging....violins and cellos are playing roundball running up and down the court and I start yelling, FOUR CORNERS, FOUR CORNERS, where's Dean Smith when you need him? So I says to the guy, "guy, my humble system is better than this, what else you got?" So we retire to the REALLY BIG ROOM, Audio Research to port and Classe' to starboard. Classe' CDP is $1500 clams, a bi-valve, but it's mine for 13, let's listen. Only one problem: he won't take the player to the poor man's room. Got one of those telephone switchboard things with the garden hoses terminated with Neutriks for switching.So now Rimsky's spinning on the Classe' thru 5 grand of electronics into the lesser of the 2 vonSchwiekert's. (I'm not complaining, nobody else has ever let me into the REALLY BIG ROOM before, ever, I look like a guy who works with his hands.) Talk about blown away, talk about holographic imaging, talk about musical...you get the point. BUT WHAT DOES THE CD PLAYER SOUND LIKE? And this was a really nice guy who was trying to please! Any of you who make their living selling know what I mean when I say that I asked every buying question in the book, musta said 8 times "I wonder how it would sound in my system?" Did he offer a trial? No. Would I have given him $1300 to take either one home on trial? Of course. So why shouldn't we buy on the Net? Anybody got a CD player suggestion for me? I don't need to hear it. I'll take your word for it. Honest.