The current SOTA SACD player

Fascinating discussion as usual. . . yet, I am still convinced that the BEST player in the world has not been built, and likely never will be. What is one audiophile's Nirvana, is most often than not another one's audio Purgatory. . . or actuall audio Hell, in my case, when I listened to one particular system, both digital and analog, from a European brand mercifully not mentioned in this thread! MAKSHACK, I discovered at the Denver Audiofest last week that you are not the only one to get heart palpitations when listening to nasty sounding aledgedly SOTA equipment. This thing was so grating that it made me long nostalgically for the brutal but honest enharmonic shriek of the high-speed drill of my dentist, when only two weeks ago he trapanated into my broken top-left incisor tooth with the aid of a diamond-tip.

Conversely, both the NWO-2.5 and the EMM Sig I heard in Denver sounded reasonably acceptable to my ears, if not exactly overwhelming.

Gregm, my dentist's drill is a highly modded device sporting twin 6H30 drivers protruding gracefully from behind the handle. It has a marvellous midrange bloom. It is rumoured of having been re-designed by a former engineer of AudioNote.

Thank you so much Brent and Boa2. Yes, I did not feel I was being trapanated while listening to APL and EMM. As I said, both room sounded fairly reasonable.