Moon impressions

I have a sim dealer close by and he asked if I would bring my meridian G08 to compare to his super nova in his sim stack. Both of us prefered the meridian. More musical with better 'prat'. I would say the only thing better about the super nova was it has a lower noise floor.

A couple of months later while I was demoing speaker cables my meridian started to have playback problems. The dealer loaned my his super nova while I sent the meridian in for service. In my system (bryston) I still prefered the meridian.

The only other player I demoed in my home was the esoteric sa-10. To me the esoteric had more detail which was great on great recordings but sterile sounding on recordings that were not so good.

So to me the esoteric was too detailed and lacked musicality and the super nova was in between.

Thats my opinion

read my review of a sim audio cd player on audiophilia.com .

My first experience with Sim audio cdp goes back to couple years. While I was impressed with the sheer resolution, pure tone, prodigious bass extension and authoritative presentation, I never did warm up to Sim audio's somewhat colourless and less involving signature.

That was until I heard the new $1.5 K Moon CD-1. This new model while do not have the ultimate in audiophile qualities with the more expensive models, somehow infuse a tonal richness and timbral rightness I have not encountered in Sim's earlier models. I thought Sim audio has striked a sweet spot with the value equation with the CD-1, and easily amongst the best I have heard at this price point. The soundstage.com review is spot on. I have not heard the latest Super Nova, but if it is anywhere building on these strength would be a winner in my books.

Not to get too far off-topic, but the CD-1 was the first CDP by Simaudio to use what they claim to be their own transport, right down to the software. The only other CDP that they have made based on this new architecture is the new CD-3.3, so that can likely be considered to be the only Sim CDP that "builds" on the CD-1. There's also a CD-.5 that has just come out, which likely takes some away from the CD-1 (and seems to signal that Sim is stretching down to an area of the market that normally belongs to Cambridge and Rega).

I haven't heard any of the CDP's in this new series.

I auditioned many CD players including Esoteric, Audio Research, Classe, Audio Aero and others before deciding to purchase the SimMoon Andromeda. I do not own any other SimMoon products and I have not been disappointed.

Thank you for your responces all, I'm looking to make the last change in my CD player and call it quites but I'm not rushing. I'm very attached to my ARC CD2 and it's sound but have been drawn tword the Sim line without any thumbs up or down as to how they sound. I'm going to purchase used and have my eyes on an ARC CD3, Bryston BCD1 and have considered Sim as well (Equniox SE, Moon 5.3 or maybe Super Nova), as to my questions and since this is used for RED BOOK CDS ONLY, I don't want to make a mistake. I can only audition the Bryston (when they get them in again) to compare as of now I guess the route to look at would be staying with ARC in my system unless, you would be kind enough to point me at a different afore mentioned unit I was reffering to? Thanks to everyone (so far) for your responces).

I am using 5.3 from an equinox.And also am very happy with sim sound.I am using sim amplification,Want to bump up to 5.3 so cant tell you on mixing components,goodluck.