SACD Players

You might check out Michael Gindi's review in the Winter issue of Ultimate Audio where he and Lars Fredell compared the Sony SCD-1 and the new Marantz SA-1 SACD/CD players.

If I might respectfully disagree with Simon: 1. History has taught us that the best product a company like Sony makes is in general, their first, flagship, product. After that, it's how can can the product be made more cheaply. 2. This is a fact: the combi drives out there today as used in the Sony are no where near the equal of the best drives available or the SCD-1 drive. The leading designers who have tried the new "universal" drives all tell me they are sadly lacking in quality. Then look inside the SCD-1 and check out the build quality, transport isolation and case -- and compare that with the 9000ES. 3. I'm wondering how the 9000ES, which converts DSD to PCM in the course of processing, can be better than the SCD-1? 4. The WL PO is THE worst CD Kavi has ever made. 5. Since you don't detail your vinyl system, it's hard to tell your reference point but the SCD-1 does not equal my TNT V/JMW-12.5 and either Parnassus DCt or Clearaudio Discovery. The only area where the the SACD player comes close is in low frequency dynamics -- but it still falls down when it comes timbre eg. listen to a piano and how all the low frequency registers sound the same. The SCD-1 is clearly bested in the most critical midrange area where it's still lean and lacking in three dimensionality.