2 Questions about Audio Aero Capitole

Good questions.

Okay, The Capitole comes with a circuit board that supports the P4, P5, etc. chip. I think the very latest Capitole comes with a P6.5 chip that has an analog passthru so you can run your tuner through it and dispense with a Pre altogether, unless you are still using vinyl.

The advantage os this is that you get a very high quality CD player that has volumn control and you save on buying sererates and you are also avoiding having to send the signal through more components.

Can an older P4 or P5 Capitole be upgraded? Yes. This means changing the circuit board and the rear of the unit. This is good in that you can get the 'latest' unit without having to pay for the whole thing again.

I echo Golden Ears in that it probably takes an updated circuit board to go from the P4 to the P5 chip. My Capitole had one of the earliest P4 chips and it still had a few 'ghosts' in it that on occasion forced me to power the whole system down so that it could start accepting my commands again. When I sent it to the shop we all worked together and came to an agreement to upgrade my circuit board and I got the P5.6 chip which works really well and now it reads those very few CDs that the older version could not.

It only very soon thereafter that Darryl at Digital Systems was able to demonstrate that an older Capitole could also be upgraded to the analog passthru.

So, if you are looking to buy one with a P4 chip you might just be okay; and you can look forward to an upgrade sometime in the future.