CD Player advice

Last week I had sold all of my hifi and was going to be content with the Linn Classik and Proac Tablettes that I had bought for the time being. Now, due to some irresistible deals I have aquired another amp and pair of speakers and I need some advice about suitable CD players to match them.

The amp is a Chord CPM 2600 and the speakers are Living Voice Avatar OBXR's. Both seem to be excellent especially the speakers which are a huge improvement on the standard Avatars that I used to use. I am using a Primare D30.2 disc player which is sounding good but is sold and being collected on Sunday.

Budget is flexible but I really want to buy something that, hopefully I will not have the urge to upgrade in the too near future.

Thanks for your help.

Mike

 

Chord DAC 64 or Wadia would be a good place to start.

Tell you what, even better, stuff the Chord in the back of the car and go to Definitive Audio in nottingham.

You can then try and discuss different CDPs with the maker of the obx himself... listening through some obx's as you dem.

Chris

 

Thanks Chris

Was considering Wadia (maybe 850?) but also Copland. 822 or 289 at a good price. Again opinions much appreciated.

Mike

 

I know me and Mike have been going on about it recently, but Simaudio make great players. How about the Nova CD player? Its very good.

http://www.simaudio.com/moonnova.htm


Cheers, Robbo

 

Thanks for that Robbo, looks interesting. I notice that there is one on ebay at the moment:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3073670447&category=3272&rd=1

Does this belong to a Zerogain member?

Regards

Mike

 

I'm told that Eikos and Shanling each make reasonably good players. I'd be interested to hear opinions on this.

 

Mike,

I'm pretty sure its not a zerogain member. If you did want to go for sim, it is far better to buy from audiogon. I've seen them on audiogon up for less than $2K, that would equate to about £1400 with shipping and taxes.

you'd need to run it off a step down transformer or get Redline to do a voltage conversion though.

Cheers Robbo

 

ho ho ho...I went the minimalist route with the classik, and its excellent in itself, a tad bass light, but as good as most separates.
I did however find I was missing the bits, and the toys and fiddling

"We are not judged on how things are, but how they APPEAR to be....."

 

The Classik was OK, perhaps a bit rough around the edges and lacking in definition. It is going today!

I have been quoted $2300 for a new Sim Nova from the states. This is plus shipping, duty and CC charges but sounds very tempting. Does anyone know where I can buy a suitable step down transformer or as Robbo said would it be better to get Redline to mod the voltage?

Thanks

Mike

 

Mike,

That sounds like a very good buy!

Merlin has some stepdown transformers, but I think he is away on holiday. You'd probably be able to get something from RS/Maplin. I reckon your best bet though would be to get a Trichord/ben duncan powerblock/stepdown transformer. You will then clean up the mains as well. makes a very useful difference.

Cheers, Robbo

 

Mike the Copland 289 , is a good choice and can be made to sing well, I think Oxford Audio consultants have one. Wm

 

Thanks WM. I have heard a Copland 289 before and thought that it sounded good. The one at Oxford Audio is £1300, this seems a little over priced - I have emailed them to see if they will negotiate.
How does this compare to the 266? Also what tweaks could one have done to a 289 to make it sound better?

Regards

Mike

 

The 266 is a more open and airy, but thinner and had less drive, but good still the same, the 289 has all the basics, solid chassis, half about power suppiles, BB 1702's and the VRDS so you start at a better point.
Mods, most things are possible, usual stuff, clocks seperate psu for it, regs/caps/opamps, we do also use unqiue circuitry in our mods, so if you are interested then please PM.
Do consider the sim player though, it has decent sound.
What cables are you going to use between chord and player? Wm

 

What cables are you going to use between chord and player? Wm

Thanks again WM. I am going to try and listen to the SIM and, if I can, the Copland in the next couple of weeks. I am going to have to be fairly quick as the Primare D30 is going tomorrow leaving me without a CD player other than my Pioneer DVD player.
As for cables, no idea at this stage. I have been using Nordost Red Dawn, again all sold. Seem to be OK value second hand but would not buy new. What would you suggest?

Regards

Mike

 

Re: What cables are you going to use between chord and player? Wm

Mike, I've owned chord SPM 1200C and had Nordost with it Spm & R/D the chord is pretty dynamic and alive, but can get a touch hard on occations, and the R/D or SPM certainly don't help there, again depending on your CD purchase, Cardas Neutal ref, (the golden ref, is very good too), with a hint of mid range warmth is a nice all rounder & suits a wide varitey of systems well, not too dear either, Shunyata's middle i/c is quite good too, A/Z matrix ref/silver ref are nice, audioquest dragon/python are good too, AU 24 very natural and sweet, great vocals & harmonic Tech 'magic link' is good too, oh and the 'Freedom' & 'The Gladiator' are some of Omiga audios offerings which do the biz also. Wm

 

Mike

The two guys I know of who've owned the 289 are Lawrie and dominicT (a recoring studio owner who seems to have disappeared some time ago). IIRC dominicT felt the 289 got a big lift when he put it on pulsar points and was very happy for a while, but then sold it for a rather (10yr) old Wadia x64 DAC and transport, which he felt was a very big step up. Lawrie now uses the 289 to drive a Doxa DAC, although he's been looking at other things recently. Lawrie'e still around, so it may be worth dropping him a line.

 

Suggestion...

Don't overlook the Resolution Audio Opus 21. It's an excellent player for the money, offering the most music I heard when I did my 2002 cd player binge test. What's best of all is that it's very very reasonably priced indeed, especially stateside. In the UK we get the £=$ conversion which sucks, but even still at this price it represents superb value relative to the likes of Sim Audio, Wadia and Naim.

jtc

 

One man's meat is another man's...

I thought the Op21 quite vile. But then horses for courses and other cliches...

 

jtc - What other players did you have a listen to on your "binge"?

Graham - Could you elaborate a bit more on the Opus?

 

Thanks for your replies everyone. I think that I have a reasonable short list to have a go at. Incidentally, I went into my local dealer today and he recommended a couple of things including a very expensive Wadia 860 but also a player made by a company called Classe who I have not heard of at all. Anyone any ideas?

Thanks and regards

Mike