Rayhall- interesting comments/judgement on the Capitole, considering you have not heard it. I own it, and the bass is extremely satisfying, and of course, other system contributors will have an effect on this.
That being said, your friend is partially correct in that if we extrapolate that there ARE other CD players that may carve even tighter bass. I can attest to this, as my previous player (I feel world-class in its own right) had the best/tighest/biggest bass if ANY CDP- partially due no doubt to its incredible transport- the Sim Audio Eclipse. I sold it only because I was able to replace 3 boxes with one- Goodbye Eclipse; DCS Purcell upsampler; and ARC preamp, and hello Capitole- one box solution with analog volume control and a palpability to the vocals that beat the Eclipse.
All that being said, I would LOVE to compare the Eclipse (again, I feel probably one of the best transport sections around) with a top-level 24/192 upsampling outboard DAC, such as Mephisto II; A. Aero Prima; etc. Now THAT would be interesting...
That being said, your friend is partially correct in that if we extrapolate that there ARE other CD players that may carve even tighter bass. I can attest to this, as my previous player (I feel world-class in its own right) had the best/tighest/biggest bass if ANY CDP- partially due no doubt to its incredible transport- the Sim Audio Eclipse. I sold it only because I was able to replace 3 boxes with one- Goodbye Eclipse; DCS Purcell upsampler; and ARC preamp, and hello Capitole- one box solution with analog volume control and a palpability to the vocals that beat the Eclipse.
All that being said, I would LOVE to compare the Eclipse (again, I feel probably one of the best transport sections around) with a top-level 24/192 upsampling outboard DAC, such as Mephisto II; A. Aero Prima; etc. Now THAT would be interesting...