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Transport and DAC or Upgrade CDP?

I'll admit to being a total newbie when it comes to anything more advanced than comparing standalone CDPs in my system. I'm currently using a Music Hall CD25.2 and also have a Cambridge 540D (v1) sitting idle.

Comparing the two in my system leaves me with these impressions: CD25.2 is more open, detailed and gives a wider sense of space, but is a bit cold and lacks analog warmth. 540D is warm, but it's not even close to the same level of performance as CD25.2.

In order to get to a better performance level I'm considering either selling both and moving to a better CDP (Jolida 100a maybe?), or using the 540D as a transport with a tube DAC. I'm looking at the TAD TACs most closely (TADAC and TDAC), but open to other suggestions as I know very little about them.

So...my question is...what's the consensus as to the better approach? Adding digital music is a consideration for down the road, but not top priority now. I really have no idea how to evaluate transports, and buying a whole bunch of gear for trial is out of the question.
meskandar

Showing 1 response by nonoise

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nonoise
10,540 posts
 
You might want to consider the TEAC PD-H600. I wanted to get off this merry-go-round and settle on a CDP and the TEAC fits my bill to a tee. Absolute Sound gave it a product of the year already and its not readily available but worth searching out. The cost of it ($999) was at the bottom limit of where I was going to go just for a DAC and then there was the transport to consider, not to mention the coax cable. It sounds fabulous, to my ears, and has yet to break in.
The guys at Esoteric did their homework on this one, for us commoners.
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