Recently, I got to allocate some money for HiFi and immediately ordered isoacoustics GAIA 3 for my floor standers. Was contemplating buying a CD player and was wondering whether spending some extra $$$ on a CD player will make sense.
I currently use a 5 year old Marantz CD player (CD 6005) which has been behaving pretty well until very recently when it started skipping CDs a lot. Had it serviced and things have been quite ok for the last couple of days.
I just discovered a pretty Ok deal for a Marantz ND 8006 brand new and was wondering whether there will be a significant improvement over the current setup.
Currently my gears are:
Source: Marantz CD 6005, Project Classic Turntable with Ortofon 2M Blue and Chrome cast for Spotify
Amplification: Prima Luna Dialogure Premium Pre-amp and Parasound 2250 V2 power Amp,
Speakers: B&W CM9 S2
Seeking suggestions on the impact of upgrading a CD player considering that is my most used HiFi source.
I think you’re answering your own question here. Even if the sonic improvement isn’t dramatic, feature like network connectivity sounds appealing. Although a 5 year life on a CD player, I’d be miffed giving the same manufacturer more of my money.
The market for used high end CD players is good, maybe look there as well.
Great that you picked up on the sales pitch I was making to myself on behalf of Marantz
I was actually wondering how much “improvement” can be achieved by upgrading the CD player at this price range. I actually dont have much experience here. I previously used to run a DVD player through a DAC before I bought the 6005.
The problem is, when I am trying to fix something that is not broken in my HiFi, I do reduce the fund for buying more CDs/ Vinyls.
So what I would do here is honestly stick with your current cd player if it’s working fine, and grab a nice dac for your system connected to the player, as that’s where you will see the most improvement imo
Not the guy to provide advice to you on CD player sound. I have a bit over 300 CDs right now and no CD player. I ripped it all and went the streamer route.
Some people swear by the quality of some older CD players 10 or 15 years old!
To be honest, if I am not spending on a new CD player, would rather go for a relatively budget DAC with at least two digital inputs (one for CD player and one for the Chrome cast). Then again, the expectation would be to for the DAC to outperform the on-board DAC of the 6005. Not sure if that would be a tall task for a budget DAC. Got any suggestions?
So I would go a bit higher than a budget dac imo, to actually give your setup a more substantial upgrade. On your current setup, what do you like and what would you change? (basically what aspects of your system do you want to prioritize)
Well what I dont like is hard to pin down on equipment cause I think it has something to do with the room acoustics. The low sometimes sounds a bit out of control. I would go for panels but since its in the living room, my wife has a policy …“Nothing gets on the wall unless she approves the design and isn’t signed by an artist she likes”
Hence the GAIA. When you talk about higher than a budget DAC, what kind of price range are you talking about?
I mean I think in your setup around the 1k mark for a dac would make sense, or at minimum around 600-700. Like in your setup I think a schiit bifrost 2 would preform pretty well if you didn’t mind something a bit on the more neutral slightly warmer slightly smoother a bit wider side of things. Good tonal density and body overall with nice texture and resolution but not shoved in your face, good bass control as well.
You know I was going through the reviews of bifrost as well. Unfortunately, there are no dealers of Shciit in the country were I live.
We have Parasound, Prima Luna, project, Marantz etc and a lot of Chinese brands like Topping and Fiio. The import duties are crazy for overseas shipping. Probably the $600 DAC would end up costing like $1200.
To get something like Bifrost, need to wait for my next visit to US.
Topping D90…now that’s available here and within the same price bracket…any suggestions? I use two lower end topping products for my Headphone setup and they are not bad.
Yeah, saw the EVO 100 at the store, really expensive, sounds stunning though. They actually use a 6005 as a transport for that setup. But can’t bring myself to buy a DAC that would cost more than my Speakers and Power Amp combined
Try and find a good used cd that can be used as a solid transport (TEAC vrds for one example.)
You can then add an outboard DAC which is where the real improvements have been made in recent years and are quite cheap relatively speaking.
@M0N is right. If you want an improvement get a DAC. Or amp or speakers or whatever. The Marantz CD transports are good and buying a new one is useless - it most likely has the exact same transport that your current unit does. And probably the same or very similar inboard DAC as well.
