Wadia 861 vs. Gamut CD1r vs Sonic Frontiers T3/P3

Pass on the Sonic T3/P3...BUT, areal sleeper is the SFD2 mark3...which does 24/96 unlike the much more expensive P3.
Match it with a D2D upsampler/reclocker with the I2se interface and a nice transport and you have a world class sound for a very reasonable.
dan

Ultrakaz- mahalo for the info. People said the same thing about the Gamut amp, which I owned and I agree about the Gamut's balanced sound. I'd like to compare the Wadia 301 to the Gamut CD1R.

I had the opportunity to compare the GamuT to the Wadia 830 before buying. With the Wadia, I foudn myself thinking about the detail, resolution and soundtaging; with the GamuT I found myself pulled into the music at an emotional level. Critical listening, as difficult as it was, revealed that all the same details were there, but they weren't presented as such; they were a part of the musical fabric.

For what it's worth, I own the De Capos as well, and the GamuT has a similar balance and musicality (which does not mean 'creative frequency response') that gets right to the point of making music. These two are very happy together in my system, although I think they're conspiring to replace my amp with something tubed and very expensive.

As far as the bass response goes: my $150 Audio Alchemy DDE 2 (with some uprated PS) has more/louder bass than the GamuT. A $1000 cd player I had in the system recently had even more, although with precious little control over it. The jump from 'more bass' to 'better player' escapes me. The key is in finding the correct/natural frequency response.

I think the P3 is an excellent DAC. I have not heard it with the T3, but I use it with the sony xa 777es as transport. I use the meridian 518 for anti jitter/noise shaping and it sound just extraoridinary. On the TELARC SAMPLER 2, in which the sources were recorded with DSD, analog or hi-rez PCM, the P3 sounds as good as the two channel sacd layer. The sacd has better organic flow, but the P3 has better bass, detail and slam. They are so close, it is not a really a question to me if one or the other is better, just if on a particular recording one or the other might be preferable with sacd or pcm.
The SF MK3 is also good, but not as spacious sounding as the P3 on redbook sources. However, it is incredibly good on DAD with 96/24 sources. The 96/24 DAD sound has great solidity, body, and tonal accuracy compared to the somewhat lighter sounding sacd.
The P3 is much better sounding than the redbook dac built in to the xa 777es. I don't think the built in dac of the xa 777es, even with mods, could ever compete with the P3 i.e. the P3 has bulletproof power supply and incredible output stage as well as the still state of the art ultra analog dac's. The built in dac of the xa 777es seems to have the sound compressed into a fish eye oval compared to the P3, which sounds limitlessly spacious and open.

I just came back from a local hi-fi shop and heard the Gamut. No bottom end on it, sounded very thin to me compared to a basic Wadia 301. Even a bit compressed comapritively.

Id go with a Wadia. Get a 301 with a Reference GNSC upgrade all for less than $4000(And I believe you can get brand new fully modded cd players from them too for the price of a basic unit). You get a better sounding player than a Wadia 861 with the big parts and chassis damping upgrade.