The best CD Player for the money

Mr. Hi End Audio, Dave, if you recall, several months ago you were apparently quite impressed with the APL Denon you've heard at Steve's (against your current “greatest” at the time) so you personally called me to place an order for APL Denon 3910 which I refused after careful consideration, sorry to say. Steve offered you the APL Denon recently because he thought you’d still want one (which you did) and because he has NWO-2.5 coming in a couple of weeks from now. He asked me if I am ok with him selling you my Denon on which of course I said no, sorry again. Why a competitor wants to buy my discontinued product anyway? While I suspect why you want to buy it now, please be cautious because you may encounter a boomerang effect. :-)

I am perfectly aware (in great detail) how all Denon, Sony, Pioneer, Esoteric and many more players/combos are built. I also know that upgrading components brings very nice results (been there done that) and is a good value at the price point but, sadly, this approach is limited by the original circuit/overall design topology of the given digital player and is greatly insufficient if best possible results are desired.

Please let's stop beating a dead horse! The APL 3910 was discontinued long time ago and, although it’s still quite good, it can not hold a candle against the current APL products.

Happy New Year!

:-)

Regards,
Alex

Just got back from Miami, where I heard a Wadia 270 transport with the 27i DAC. Or as I was told a computer processor.

At any rate if I could afford this combo I could finally put my analog to rest. If there is better than this I have yet to hear it in digital. At $15,995 for the combo, thats a mighty price to pay for digital to sound as good as a $2K analog set up.

Ferrari, we've found that using any number of DVD-ROM RAM Buffered transport equipped players (Denon/Marantz/Esoteric)
run into heavily upgraded DAC even older dacs by Theta, Linn, Monarchy and Krell completely crush any 1 box player we have heard....they sound lightweight small, lacking bass drive, micro and macro dynamics, thin and strident. Trick is using the right SPDIF coaxial interconnect and using an error and jitter-free transport. Based on numerous A-B's we've done, there is no need to rebuild the circuit design with hotglued breadboards and wiring all over the place.

The Wadia set was not a one box set up. But with that being said,all else that was with this system was way far over the top. Wilson Watt speakers Pass Labs Mono Blocks,Goldmund preamp. Plus some very esoteric interconnects and speaker cables.

After some 48 years in this hobby, I think I finally heard what I consider the ultimate achievement in two channel audio. There is certainly nothing in the past I have heard that can come close and I have heard some very exotic gear in that period of time. It was like being completely immersed in the music, like you could dip your hand into the sonic signature, truly a musical experience I have not experienced till then.

In regards to this thread best CD Player for the money, I have to tip my hat to the Wadia set up. In my opinion it is best for the money,if you have $16K to spend on a digital set up.

Ferrari, although I am sure that the Wadia combo is excellent, according to someone who is the F1 legend Michael Schumacher’s neighbor in Switzerland, his recently acquired $22,000 universal digital player sounds as good as and sometimes better than his $65,000 vinyl setup. Coincidentally, same result was reported from another fine gentleman who A-B-ed the same digital player against his $32,000 vinyl setup.

Just FYI! And no, the above is not a joke!

BTW, the universal digital player in question is a single box player which...

sounds lightweight small, lacking bass drive, micro and macro dynamics, thin and strident

Of course, this same universal player features things as explained by Mrhiendaudio...

there is no need to rebuild the circuit design with hotglued breadboards and wiring all over the place

In other words you should just get...

any number of DVD-ROM RAM Buffered transport equipped players (Denon/Marantz/Esoteric)run into heavily upgraded DAC even older dacs by Theta, Linn, Monarchy and Krell completely crush any 1 box player we have heard

And you are all set!

:-)

Regards,
Alex