One man's affordable is another man's unobtanium. What is your budget?
On the very low end are the Oppo players. They are very good considering the price of entry.
An Oppo mod'd by Ric Shultz at EVS http://www.tweakaudio.com is a major step toward state of the art SACD/CD/DVD/DVD-A/HDCD playback. For somewhere between $500-$1000 total (including the cost of the player and mod) you can have an excellent universal player.
I have not owned or demo'd any big buck SACD players, so I don't know how the stock or mod'd Oppo compares. However, I have owned many different CD players that retailed for $1500-$3500. My EVS level 2 mod'd Oppo 970 is definately in the same league as the big buck dedicated CD players for redbook performance.
I totally understand some folk's reluctance toward mod'd players. But Ric has been in the business for a very long time and stands behind his work. If you send Ric a brand new Oppo for mods, I believe he will even offer you a full refund of the purchase+mod price in the event you don't love it. I will caution that my mod'd player took a very long time to break-in. If you buy it, plan to play it continuously for a week or two before passing final judgement.
Enjoy,
TIC
On the very low end are the Oppo players. They are very good considering the price of entry.
An Oppo mod'd by Ric Shultz at EVS http://www.tweakaudio.com is a major step toward state of the art SACD/CD/DVD/DVD-A/HDCD playback. For somewhere between $500-$1000 total (including the cost of the player and mod) you can have an excellent universal player.
I have not owned or demo'd any big buck SACD players, so I don't know how the stock or mod'd Oppo compares. However, I have owned many different CD players that retailed for $1500-$3500. My EVS level 2 mod'd Oppo 970 is definately in the same league as the big buck dedicated CD players for redbook performance.
I totally understand some folk's reluctance toward mod'd players. But Ric has been in the business for a very long time and stands behind his work. If you send Ric a brand new Oppo for mods, I believe he will even offer you a full refund of the purchase+mod price in the event you don't love it. I will caution that my mod'd player took a very long time to break-in. If you buy it, plan to play it continuously for a week or two before passing final judgement.
Enjoy,
TIC