Upgrade CD transport/player vs. Sacd transport/player

@kjl1065   I compared one SACD (Joni Mitchell's Ladies of the Canyon) with the high-res stream from Qobuz, and the SACD revealed depth to the acoustic guitar in
"The Priest" not heard on the stream, which theoretically should have been superior given its 24/192 resolution.  I use a Geerfab D.BOB to pass DSD to my DAC.  So, this tells me DSD can be superior to PCM.  And it tells you that any SACD transport with an HDMI output could be used, in conjunction with a unit like the D.BOB, to pass DSD to your DAC.

FWIW, I use an old Cambridge Audio CXU universal disc player as my transport.  It handles Blu-Ray as well as SACD and DVD, so it works well and obviates the need to buy an additional Blu-Ray player, although the latter can be had inexpensively.  I don't know how common it is for SACD players to have an HDMI output, but players made for video-type discs are likely to have them.

I also want to suggest you give Music Direct or whichever dealer you’re thinking of purchasing the Onyx from a call. Confirm that Onyx outputs DSD from its AES digital out. Then confirm with EMM Labs that the MA3i will accept that signal. I think it should but double checking it with them won’t hurt. 

@kjl1065 

I thought the transport does the decoding

No, that is the big difference between a player and a transport.  Players decode, transports just extract the digital information.

I cannot believe how badly North Americans have screwed up SACD.  If you can handle HDMI, then all you really need is a universal disk transport, which can be as inexpensive as a couple of hundred bucks, new.  See: I own this 4K Blu-ray player, and I think it’s a better and cheaper option than Netflix Premium this Black Friday | What Hi-Fi?

That transport handles SACD, CD and Pure Audio Blu-ray as well as video formats. It has two HDMI outlets, one dedicated to audio.  With hybrid SACDs, you can choose whether to output the CD layer, or either 2-channel or multi-channel DSD.  Pure Audio opens up multi-channel high resolution PCM, as well as Dolby Atmos.

It is dead-simple plug-and-play into HDMI-equipped pre-amps.  Remember HDMI currently supports 48-Gbps so why not get seriously simple?

Looking to purchase the Meitner MA3i dac while using their network.  Will the Meitner network be user friendly without the necessity of purchasing Roon? I did research on Roon, and discovered that they do not offer telephone support. Lack of telephone support is a deal breaker for me.    

@kjl1065  -    

@hjdca gets to the heart of the matter.  If you go the transport & DAC separates route -  to make it all work out nice and neatly - you will need to go with I2S (HDMI like) connections.  So your choices in equipment may be limited.

I went with the PS Audio PerfectWave SACD transport and PS Audio PerfectWave DAC (Mk I).  With special purchases, I am all in for about $6K.  Big money to me, bigger now with how prices have skyrocketed in the last 3 or so years.

If I didn't go this route, I would have looked at Luxman's cd player offerings more closely.

Prior to purchasing the PSA equipment, I had one of the original SACD changers, the SONY 555 SCD from 25 years ago.  It was/ is still working fine, but I became nervous about getting it repaired or having a laser replaced, since SONY's Laredo repair facility (the ones who performed repairs) had mixed reviews.

With the PSA transport, Redbook CDs sound much better - fuller sounding, more detailed.  So much so, that I felt redbook approached how SACDs were sounding.  

Rich