CD Player Modifications. Is it worth the ?

Please speak for yourself Eric and don't put words in my mouth. I stand by my statements.

The person that told me this has a Stan Warren modified Pioneer DVD player. He also has a very good quality redbook cd player from a "mass production" manufacturer. Stan told him that the modified Pioneer DVD would NOT match the low frequency qualities or capabilities of his stock CD player. Stan clearly stated this before he had begun to modify the Pioneer, so he did "flat out" say such a thing. He was being as up-front as he could be with the customer and for that, i applaud his honesty.

As such, my statements are not "corrupt", second hand "bullshit" or relying on "special circumstances" such as someone comparing the modified Pioneer DVD to a much more expensive outboard DAC, etc... The person that told me this still has the Pioneer player and i communicate with them on an almost daily basis. He has NO reason to "BS" me nor would i want or expect him to. I told him up front that i didn't think that the DVD player would match his CD player in bottom end warmth or body. My exact words were that they sound "crisp, clean and open but are somewhat lean". Stan basically confirmed those thoughts over the phone with him, but the owner still went ahead with the modifications anyhow. To be quite frank, he received the player back after having it modified and was not overly excited about it. The player has been relegated to his bedroom system.

I was informed by another Audiogon member that the "lack of performance" on some newer Pioneer DVD players is due to a production change. Pioneer has decided to change the internal DAC's and the units don't perform as well. For all that i know, the above mentioned Pioneer DVD may be one of these models and why Stan mentioned what he did to the customer.

For the sake of clarity, the information regarding the Pioneer DAC change was divulged directly by Stan Warren to this A-gon member TODAY while Stan was at his house. I spent quite a bit of time talking to this gentleman last night arranging a business deal. Everything went as smoothly as possible and it was as pleasant as could be. Given previous correspondance with him, i have no reason to doubt these statements or his integrity in passing them on.

As i have stated before, i only post information that i have experienced first hand or has been passed on to me by what i would deem a reliable source. Like anything else though, it is up to you as an individual to believe who and what you want to. Sean
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I floated my old Rotel on a Neuance iso-shelf and was amazed at the improvement in coherence and reduced fatigue.
$150 experiment that is instantly reversible...and reuasable with any upgrade later. Ern

When you speak about the value of modifying Pioneer DVD's, you need to speak of those models that are worth modifying. I have a Pioneer 503C carousel, which while working quite well overall as a transport, has developed a number of frustrating mechanical problems over its short life, and would likely not be a good candidate for several hundred dollars worth of mods. I really only expect to get a year or two of service out of this unit and don't see it as a long term purchase. To its credit, it was inexpensive and does a decent job as both a DVD player and an audio transport. However, there are likely higher quality Pioneer units that would certainly provide better value when modified.

I have spoken to Stan Warren on a number of occassions and he believes in his work. You need to have a Pioneer or Onkyo DVD player with the Burr Brown 24/96 or higher DAC. I cannot believe he would downplay what he does. If Stan did say something similar to what Sean is relating, he may have been comparing his modded Pioneer against a $2500+ player. (He has said such to me, but did not feel they were much better). So you can spend $450 for a Pioneer DVD player modded by Stan or spend $2500+ for something better; it is your money.

I have both a Pioneer DV333 in one system and a MSB Link DAC modded by Stan in another. If was worth more than every penny.

"Mods" very much understates what Stan really does. He redesigns large portions of the original circuit, removing bugs and design oversights, and upgrades the parts quality of the most
important components. He can be reached at (541)344-3696

Dan Wright at www.modwright.com does similar work.

The following is a link of a comparison of Stan's DVD player and a Camelot Morganna player. There is also lots of comments on Stan at the Chicago Audio Society website archives of meetings, etc. A Stan modded MSB Link DAC is their reference player.

http://decware.com/forums/General/posts/2403.html

http://www.chicagoaudio.org/

With no offense to Dan Wright, i would not place his level of experience or knowledge anywhere near that of Stan Warren's. As most of you know, Stan has been working with audio for a couple of decades now as both a designer and "tweaker". Someone with knowledge of advanced circuitry, years of experience and a good head on their shoulders is a tough combo to beat. This is not to say that Dan's work is not good or appreciated though, as his long list of satisfied customers and public testimonials says quite a bit about how far he has come in such a short period of time. I do know that he is working with some very knowledgable people and doing his best to "pick their brains".

As to my comments, i did not mean to stir up a hornets nest. Since there was quite a bit of "controversy" regarding what i said, i did some further digging. I was able to find out that the DVD player in question was a Pioneer 434. This is not one of the newer models that was mentioned to me as having the "low grade" dac's in them. So far, three different people have listened to this specific player in three different systems in three different parts of the country.

The first guy thought that it was measurably better than his stock Pioneer Elite PD-65. It was appr equal to the PD-65 used as a transport and feeding an Art Dio tube Dac. It could not hang with his Sonic Frontiers transport / DAC combo though, but this is to be expected. That is, if price has anything to do with performance. The only thing that i can remember about his system is that he has both a Morrison ELAD preamp and an Audible Illusions Modulus 3A. Which one he was running, i'm not sure. I "think" that it would be his AI, as the Morrison had gone back to the factory for some updates / changes. Can't recall which amps he has, but speakers are large ribbons with multiple dynamic woofers.

When he had let it run for a couple of weeks and had become completely familiar with it, it went onto the next guys house, who is the actual owner of the unit. While i know that this sounds weird, the owner had it drop shipped to his buddies house first for him to break in. This also let user #1 see what he thought of it so that they could compare notes.

In the owners' system, he was comparing it to a stock Sony redbook player, of which i'm not sure of the model. It was not their top of the line "redbook" player and is a few years old. From what i can remember, i think that this player was somewhere around $800 - $1000 when brand new. His opinion was that he preferred the Sony within the confines of this system. I do know that he is using a modified tube preamp, a hybrid tube driver / SS amp feeding large e-stat's. At this point, he offered to send the DVD player to me to check out, but i declined. I had too much other stuff going on and didn't want to tie up his gear.

It left his house and went to the third party's house. He is using a Pioneer laser disc player with a highly modified tube preamp, highly modified hybrid tube driver / SS output amp. These two pieces have about $4500 - $5000 in modifications and upgrades done to them. I don't know what type of speakers he is running though but i do know that they are not "off the shelf" models of anything available. In this system, the owner thought that the laser disc absolutely smoked the modified DVD player. The actual owner of the modified DVD player ( tester #2 ) has since purchased an identical laser disc player to user #3 and is now waiting for its' arrival. Needless to say, he wants to do a shoot-out with the Sony, LD and DVD players to see which one really does work best with his system.

Keep in mind that these results are ALL subjective and based on personal opinions within those users systems. Based on the above info, you can see some commonality with the systems involved. All of them are making use of tubed preamps, so this might have something to do with the results and how the DVD player "loaded up". Personally, i am a believer that gear DOES change "personalities" when mated with different combo's. As such, this player may work best with passive, buffered or active SS preamps, i don't know. I may have him send the unit over here so that i can check it out. If that is the case, it would be feeding an SS preamp and SS amp, so i would get to find out first hand. If i do get the unit and people are interested, i can report back with my thoughts on the subject.

I hope that this has not pissed anyone off, as i was strictly commenting on the subject at hand and trying to relay as much "honest" information as i could. Obviously, different people have different tastes, different systems and different hearing. If everything worked the same for all people, we would not be having this conversation now nor visiting a site for used gear.... Sean
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