Are sacd mods really worth the money?

All i can say to that is "YOW" !!!! I am in the wrong business !!! Sean
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Brainwater - while it has been a while since I visited their website I was under the impression that Ref's top mods involved "silver" transformers and tipped the scales at $2100???

As for mods in general after my 333ES was "Kerned" (Level 1 mods and superclock) I found a larger positive difference on redbook vs SACD. Not that SACD was affected in a negaive manner but redbook presentation leaped forward proportionately more.

I also own a Philips although its still sitting at a buddy's place while I ponder on whether or not to get it modded as well as deciding whose mods to buy into.

All I can say is that you have to have faith in your modder of choice and what he feels will be the benefits to tweaking or gutting your Philips. You won't get your money out of the mods so keep your fingers crossed you'll like the outcome...

Thanks RGD. Sort of unsure and that helped.

At the level of your System,I think I would start off modding something better than a Philips-1000.Maybe a Pioneer DV-47ai offering SACD and DVD-a or a Sony XA777-ES with Tube output mod.Looks like the Sky is the limit at your place!! Wow !!Is this your main or secondary system?JD

Still financially reeling from the 20 s , I just could not wait for the inevitable "triclkle down " engineering in the sacd camp.I bit at Tweeter s 399 on the Phillips and wondered if the mod upgrades were worth it . Modwright and Reference Audio Mods have been great with informative , fast responses. Both offer interesting paths. To answer , this system is a dedicated multichannel room that does theatre with the Runco 1000 c dlp and 82 in firehawk. Hughes hd - direct tv gets me hdtv . Downstairs is the Classe Omega amp and preamp on Nordost valhalla and Quattro fils with either the Totem Shamans { underrated speaker by the way , its their flagship but the smaller products in his line get better press ]; or the Accoustat Spectra 66 full range ESL s coupled to a Mirage 210 sub w xternal lfx 3 x over. Source is the Bat vkd5 se as well .

BW - I am also intruigued with Dan's "absolute truth" tube mods but as they are 2 channel only I guess you one has to decide if one wants to retain multi-channel presentation or not. I am also waiting on Ric Shultz to offer his opinion on where he thinks the Philips can be bettered.

The first thing everyone who bought a Philips 1000 has to
do is, take it out of the box,break it in and listen to it.

It's a very good sounding player once it's got some hours on it.

The Reference Audio Mod's Performance Upgrade Plus mod changes a lot of parts for $1200.(parts-$782.+ labor, their stage three mod is $2100.),the key is what parts make the biggest bang for the buck.

Suggest you talk with other modifiers like Stan Warren and
see what they offer.

I plan on doing some dyi mods to my unit, but I don't think
it's wise to invest alot of money.

What's the resale value on a $400. player with a $1200. mod?
Will it sound better than a stock SA 1, that has an establish resale value?

I agree with Kana813. Although some of the mods may be great, let's face it, it is a lot of money to invest with virtually NO resale value.

I hate to say this but it is almost a gimmick with these ultra high cost mods out there. How could they possibly be a good value? I would buy a nice, proven non-modded piece with resale.

I am not certain how important multi-channel sound is to you. Myself, I would wait for a used sa-1 and not modify it. The stock marantz sa-1 and audio aero 24/192 are the best stock player's I have heard.

Modification sense depends on your budget, resale patterns, and existing system. I have only heard a/b of the higher end players, so I cannot comment on the effectiveness of mods to the lower players. I consistently read positive comments from people who have had the mods done.

I have the fully hotrodded (all the audiomod mods) scd-1, and it nukes almost everything out there. (Note: The audio aero is better if you like the tube sound). It does beat up on the SA-1, but the margin is smaller than any other unmodified solid state player, including the scd-1. The hotrod scd-1 has a cleaner sound, much wider soundstage, and superior bass slam & articulation to ANY cd playback I have heard.

My system's mods cost 3200. You can buy an scd-1 for 2300 so you are in the soup for 5500 for a ONE BOX world class cd/SACD player that has an estimated resale value of 3500-4000. My system's soundstage goes a good 10 feet past the room walls with the mods and perhaps 1-2 without. It truly does take my system to another level. If I take the player out I lose this effect. That's using a placette passive pre (1K), quattro-fil cabling(2K), an ayre v-1x(9K) & eidolon speakers(13K). This means the cd player is 5K/30K of the system cost. Good value to me.

Platsolos, you have a point. I would "hope" a SACD1000 with mods would beat up on "stock" players costing 2x the price of the player plus mods. That way, resale value is a non-issue. Else, you are right, you'd be better off with the more expensive, stock player to begin with.

If I could buy a $399 SACD1000 and put about $1k of mods into it. I'd expect to BLOW AWAY ALL $1.5k players. In fact, I'd expect it to compare favorably with players costing much more. In that case, if you're "getting $4k+" worth of sound for under $1.5k, who really cares about resale value at the point? You getting much more performance for the dollar in the first place. Resale is a (reasonably) moot point. YMMV.