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A phenomenal new CD transport-Pro-Ject CD Box RS2 transport

I have had in-house for the last week Pro-Ject's new CD Box RS2 transport to review for the website Stereo Times. I was very curious to assess its performance because it uses the Pro 8 drive with the Blue Tiger CD-84 servo card. This drive was developed and built by StreamUnlimited a company started by the original Phillips designers that historically built the finest CD mechanisms. Only two other companies use the StreamUnlimited 8 drive and Blue Tiger CD-84 servo card, their pieces cost $16,000 and $39,000 compared to Pro-Ject's sane price of $3,000!

My reference for the last two years has been the excellent Jay's Audio MK-II transport that had out-performed much more expensive highly regarded transports in my system. Well, across every sonic parameter  (transparency/micro-details-overall dynamics/bottom-end extension/purity of tonality- a much more airy sound-stage with wonderful 3D imaging) compared to the Jay's Audio transport.

That's way I titled this thread a "phenomenal new CD transport" because while not inexpensive, it just might be a bargain based on its performance. Mind you, this superlative level of performance is based on using the switching power supply that Pro-Ject ships the transport with. I have shortly coming a custom 20 watt 3 amp linear power supply from Linear Tube Audio and Pro-Ject's own upgraded power supply to see if the RS2 transport performance will even go to a higher qualitative level of performance.

I'll be writing a full detailed review for Stereo Times in the near future. However, I wanted to share this information to GON members who still spin CDs. I have had numerous CD transports in for evaluation and this just might be the best sounding of all of them.

Teajay (Terry London)




amorstereo
jriggy's avatar
jriggy
549 posts
 
@musichead , I was worried/curious about this also, and among other reasons, is why I purchased from a retailer with a trial period. Good news is no noise issues at all. During the first 20 or so CDs played through the unit there were a few with slight repetitive ‘tick’ like a fast clock but it hasn’t happened again now after a month or so. Maybe just the mechanism breaking-in, like some motorized mechanisms do… 

Question for other owners:
Does the triangle shaped “reading” symbol ever show up green? And same, does the no disk “X” icon ever show as green?? These two screen icons are usually red in color, but periodically they show as green. Why?

BUT it seems like ever since I switched to a different aes/ebu digital cable they are now always red; I haven’t seen these icons show up as green since the new cable. That’s probably a coincidence and maybe it has to do with powering down or something. 
Has anyone else seen this?

musichead's avatar
musichead
94 posts
 
Thanks, I currently use a coax cable. Learned that they aren't all the same as I upgraded to a better one. Are there advantages using the AES/EBU or I2S connections?
disc
108 posts
 
musichead, I've had mine for several months and have had noises with noise.  Very happy.  I was using optical and switched to AES/EBU and am pleased with the improvement.  There's a short discussion above about AES/EBU cable options.  Alas, I can't use the I2S in my system

griggy, re red/green, I've noticed that too.  I switched from white background to black and was wondering if that was the reason.  I'll start trying to track it.

toolbox149
248 posts
 
Two questions,
First, Anybody hooking up the Project to a PS Audio Directstream with I2S? Is it a good match? (My Jays CDT2 MK2 always had a small glitch).
Second: Speaking of the Jays, is it possible to use the aftermarket Qstab disk stabalizer on the Project unit? That little Project clamp sure looks like it could use a bigger brother.

Thank you,
Tim
80s_forever
43 posts
 
I read somewhere that Pro-Ject is not using PS Audio's I2S pinout in their implementation.  So only the companion Pro-Ject DAC is designed to work with their cd transport.
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