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How do I spend $5000? A CD player or DAC for my De

After my fiasco with auditioning McIntosh 871 universal player (which I didn't like at all) I'm now considering either buying a dedicated redbook player instead of Sony XA9000ES and keeping my Denon 3930 for DVDs only or indeed buying a DAC to use with Denon as a transport. I don't think I'm ready to spend more than $5000 for either. The thing is I simply don't know which is better - a dedicated $5000 CD player or Denon 3930 plus $5000 DAC? I'm selling Sony anyway - the rack has place for only 2 sources and of course I need a DVD player anyway. What do you,guys, think?
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antonkk
arbuckle
89 posts
 
I find it ridiculous the whole idea about spending $3500 for a media server. I have never had a computer last for more than 5 years. If you are dumping this amount of money into something that has a limited life-span it seems ridiculous. At least with a cd player you can have it for more than 5 years and repairing it can keep it around for a good 20.

Aside from that, hard drives and space are dirt cheap so I don't understand why a Qsonix would be so expensive. It just makes no sense for hard drive space and a software program to spend $3500. Just my opinions.
waltersalas's avatar
waltersalas
939 posts
 

The guy who suggested it (the media server) as an option is also a dealer. Just sayin'...
robr45's avatar
robr45
319 posts
 
Here is a vote for a DAC. An not a hugely expensive one either. Benchmark maybe...

The resale value on digital is so awful that I would to have money falling out of my ass to consider an expensive player. Couple this with relatively high failure rate and it almost becomes idiotic. Not to say that a cdp always a bad idea, but you better have addressed everything else- including room acoustics, power, etc.

Unless of course you have a ton of $ or you really are trying to get that last bit of performance.

I think your money is better spent on software. $.02
retiredfarmer's avatar
retiredfarmer
339 posts
 

A few things to remember that the manufacturers advertise in the magazine s and that is what they make money on not the price you pay for the magazine. The mags also or not perpetuate the hobby. Don't think the newest is necessarily the best use you ears. Go looking around on the used market for cd players. In my opinion the very best of them made were built around the late nineties early two thousands. That is when they very best of the breed was made. The companies were all really trying to build the best and after the new formats came the concentration when to trying to build the new formats and then to streaming. Look around for a used Linn cd12, a Sonic frontier dac and transport three, a Krell kps25,mark Levinson transport and DAC from that era sorry I forget the model number at the moment. Those are basically they best made. 

yage
399 posts
 

I think an external DAC makes more sense. It gives you more flexibility in case you change transports (e.g if the laser dies) or want to add a streamer in the future.

 

A well-engineered DAC should be largely immune to jitter or at least have artifacts below the threshold of hearing, so there's no need for fancy / expensive cables. As an example, I can't tell the difference between music streamed from my Raspberry Pi 3 B+  via USB and the same track played from the Oppo UDP-203 via SPDIF coax with both hooked up to a Benchmark DAC3 B.

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