DVD Audio player Vs good CD player

I recently purchased the Rotel DVD Audio/Video player. I auditioned the Sony 9000 also. In both cases, the sound from DVD audio was comparible to SACD, meaning on par with LP and much much better than CD.

Of course, there are few DVD audio discs available currently. Also, the players only have analog outputs, so you need to check your surround sound receiver/preamp to make sure it has analog inputs (some only have digital inputs for rear and center channel).

Regarding playing CDs, the Rotel that I have home does not sound near as good with CDs as does my Krell transport and Bitwise processsor, and neither of those are state-of-the art. Thus, if you think you will be mostly be playing CDs and DVD video, then you might want to buy a relatively inexpensive DVD player and invest more in a stand-alone or separate CD system.

Hope this helps,
Ford

See old post from 2 weeks ago titled cd vs. cd

Sorry, but according to proacman sacd and dvd-audio are comparable, this just isn't true in most cases. if you have avearge gear (read: low-fi and some mid-fi) this is true. however the more transparent and better performing your syste gets the more noticeable the gap between sacd and dvd-a, sacd wins hands down. on normal cd playback dvd-a have been reported as doing terrible and i can second this (tried it on panasonic ax-7 i believe is model number). while cd playback on scd-777 and dvp-9000 has been reported as not as good as some higher end cd playback machines at same price, it is very good to excellent (YMMV) in my opinion (i have a scd-777es) and can be output to a dac if so desired.

as for proacman's statement though take it with a grain of salt and come up with your own conclusion and listen for yourself, i think you can hear all three (sacd player, dvd-a player, and a regular cd player) at a local good guys store albeit with very limited upstream components but it should give you some clue. make sure to bring some familiar software with you and compare it on all three players.

yours in audio,

jayson

widescreen reveiw using the pioneer dvd/dvd-a/sacd player[4,500] said that dvd audio sounded worse than the 6500.00 wadia cpd and that sacd was better than the wadia.Also check out positive feedback or robert harley reveiw of the 9000es and veiws on sacd being the best.You will not find a reveiw comparing dvd-a to sacd where sacd does not win by a landslide.Also owners of both formats have all proclaimed sacd to be far superior and one of these was the new rotel dvd-a were the owner said that most redbook sounded better than the dvd-a of the rotel.Any one looking at dvd-a players must not hear very good or see as in comparison reveiws.

Thanks everyone for your input!
Joe Lienhard

I bought a Panasonic A7, a JVC 723GD, and Sony S9000ES. I also have a 2 year old Sony 300 (cost me $500). The A7 and JVC are DVD-A players. The A7, JVC, and Sony 300 had similar quality CD and DVD play.

The DVD-A play on the A7 and the JVC was noticably better than their CD play. However, CD/DVD play on the Sony S9000ES was better than DVD-A play on the A7 and JVC. The S9000ES was more dynamic and defined. SACD was another step up.

I'm sure the Rotel ($1500) is much better than the A7 and JVC. There's other high quality DVD-A players (Toshiba and Onkyo are examples) to consider.

By the way, I kept the S9000ES and returned the A7 and JVC.
I am very pleased with SACD and the current software. I've bought 16 SACDs and have a list of over 20 more I plan to buy. I bought one DVD-A disc (Aaron Nevelle). I think there's only one or two others I would buy right now. Some are getting horrible reviews.