If it was your money , would you buy this ?

[JamesMellor]

http://www.musicalfidelity.com/m1cdt/

I'm just wondering if a cd transport is the best bang for my buck , blu ray is better than apx I think , but this has a aes connection is this better ?

my budget is 6 or 700 quid , be happy if I spent nothing so don't worry about low balling me

James

 

[simonlewis]

No i would buy a 65" 4K tv.

 

[JamesMellor]

you'll not getv that for 700 quid Simon

 

[simonlewis]

True but i'm saving up maybe next year.

 

[JamesMellor]

Are there any more out there ? the MF and the cryus is all I see

 

[nima]

I am somehow surprised we don't see more (any?) CD transport reviews in the mags these days: DACs are so popular and many people still use CDs. I would like to see how let's say Rega Apollo R stands against Cyrus transport or some budget CD player or even some Oppo box (all purely as transports).

 

[nima]

There are plenty ridiculously priced transports out there, but for resonable money I don't know of any other either.

 

[JamesMellor]

Or any cdp ? I can get a NAD 516 for 160 quid ex dem , should I just buy that then dem a MF ?

James

 

[James7]

There's much to be said for getting the transport bit right. Anyone who says only the DAC matters obviously hasn't hear the difference a good transport can make. What the best way to go is, though, in order to get the best possible signal from your silver discs I am unsure. Blu ray and DVD players are reputed to generally provide pretty low jitter feeds from CD, but I still imagine that a machine dedicated solely to CD transport duties should in theory outperform anything else especially if you have a DAC with an AES input. A case of trying to audition the MF against other options I guess. Would be interested to hear your thoughts.

 

[James7]

There's much to be said for getting the transport bit right. Anyone who says only the DAC matters obviously hasn't hear the difference a good transport can make. What the best way to go is, though, in order to get the best possible signal from your silver discs I am unsure. Blu ray and DVD players are reputed to generally provide pretty low jitter feeds from CD, but I still imagine that a machine dedicated solely to CD transport duties should in theory outperform anything else especially if you have a DAC with an AES input. A case of trying to audition the MF against other options I guess. Would be interested to hear your thoughts.

 

[JamesMellor]

Hi James ,

"Blu ray and DVD players are reputed to generally provide pretty low jitter feeds from CD,"

Is that why I am hearing better from the bluray than the apx ? but the bluray is a pita to use , wont skip tracks even

James

 

[nima]

If it was really my money, 700GBP sounds a lot for a transport, it might be worth it, but (1) I would find a way to try it at home against some cheaper options as a transport.

And (2) I would try to find a CD player that sounds better on its own then through a DAC (or DAC in the amp). Even if this would mean spending 1000GPB for the player.

 

[cannibal_ox77]

Was looking around for transports before I plumped for the 8200CDQ. These Little Dot transports have got some good feedback from what I've seen, at a fraction of the price:

http://yklee118.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/little-dot-cdpi-transport-review.html

 

[cannibal_ox77]

Was looking around for transports before I plumped for the 8200CDQ. These Little Dot transports have got some good feedback from what I've seen, at a fraction of the price:

http://yklee118.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/little-dot-cdpi-transport-review.html

 

[Native_bon]

Was looking around for transports before I plumped for the 8200CDQ. These Little Dot transports have got some good feedback from what I've seen, at a fraction of the price:

http://yklee118.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/little-dot-cdpi-transport-review.html

Yes transport makes a lot of difference to sound quality.. I have tired my cambridge audio 840c, rega planet(very first model) & my oppo 105 as transports. The oppo gives far better clarity and depth to the sound... yes I picked the oppo every time blind tested.

 

[Al ears]

Are you looking to buy new or would you consider second-hand transports?

 

[MajorFubar]

If it takes a £700+ transport to play a CD then I'm sure my wife and bank-manager are very happy that I instead went down the route of ripping all my CDs with a £15 USB drive, which according to XLD's error-report performed the task with absolutely no errors in nearly all cases.

 

[nima]

And you found your Mac Mini in the bin?

Some people, me included, prefer to spin CDs.

 

[Al ears]

And you found your Mac Mini in the bin?

Some people, me included, prefer to spin CDs.

+1

 

[Native_bon]

And you found your Mac Mini in the bin?

Some people, me included, prefer to spin CDs.

+1

+2

 

[MajorFubar]

And you found your Mac Mini in the bin?

Some people, me included, prefer to spin CDs.

Think you missed my point by about as much as is conceivably possible. But don't worry about it.

 

[MakkaPakka]

I would not buy it as I think there are better uses for £6-700.

My transport cost me about £40 off ebay. It takes one second to show up the run time/track details after the door closes. It has no trouble at all with scratched discs. Apart from one very badly damaged disc (which is also impossible to rip) it has never skipped or jumped once. It also runs near silent.

I cannot hear any difference between this transport, other transports I've tried and streamed FLAC. I have a circa '93 Pioneer stable platter.

Although I would like a nice transport I'm doubtful it's money well spent. Reading CDs is not exactly difficult given what old technology they are. 20 years ago I could listen to CDs on a portable player which didn't have any audible problems unless I jumped up and down with it.

 

[MajorFubar]

Now there's a man who got my point...

 

[JamesMellor]

In the cold light of day without the beer googles on it does seem a hell of alot of money , drinks an evil thing :beer:

I think I need to carry on with my current project , ripping cd's and let everything settle in so I know I'm listening like for like and evaluate what I'm using the most.

Thanks for all the input

James

 

[MakkaPakka]

Sorry MajorFubar - I hadn't actually read your post oke:

But I think CD transports are one of those areas where you apply a little critical thinking. My blu/dvd/combi writer laptop drive thingy costs next to nothing but can make perfect rips of CDs about eight or nine times normal playback speed. I would think any purpose-built CD player operating at 1x speed should have no trouble at all. Sound quality would surely only be an issue if errors are picked up but what are the chances of that. How many errors have you heard listening to a car CD player that's bumping along the road - had any sound or picture errors watching dvds or blu rays which contain way more data?