To buy new or not to buy new...

[admin_exported]

Hi,

First time poster long time reader....

I am looking to add a CD player to my system and have a budget of £300 - £400. For this sort of money there are a few decent players new such as the Cambridge 650C or NAD C545BEE, however would i be better off going for a 2nd hand Aracm, Cyrus, Quad etc?

The reason i ask is that a few years ago i bought a 2nd hand Roksan Kandy DVD player for £150 and although it was fine to begin with it soon developed little faults such as the drawer closing/opening on it's own, disc skipping or the buttons on the player would stop working and the only way to fix this would be to unplug it from the mains.

Obiously i'm going to get a better sound from one of the higher end players but is it worth the risk considering it may break down and if it does is it economically vaiable to get it repaired?

One other option from left field - would a Pioneer PDDJ9 for £350 new be any good as the PDDJ6 for £400 was given 5 stars?

Thanks for any advice!

 

[JoelSim]

I always buy second hand and haven't had any problems. Many products are still within their warranty period which is a good back-up. Look at eBay and keep your eyes peeled for mint examples. Then you also know you will get the bulk of your cash back when you come to sell it a couple of years down the line too.

I'm just buying an ex-review Unison Research CDP to replace my year old Arcam CD192, but it comes with full warranty and is half the price of a new one. So when I come to sell it on I shouldn't lose too much.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks JoelSim, although it would be nice to get a 2nd hand player with a warranty are there really that many? I have bought and sold a number of items on eBay, including the Roksan, but they have never included a warranty. Most of the CDP's i have looked at that include a warranty tend to be ex demo and therefore attract a premium price.

I guess my question is how reliable are these older players going to be, especially in comparison to newer models or to their Japanese counterparts such as Marantz, Denon etc, and how much is it going to cost if/when they go wrong?

 

[Big Chris]

JoelSim:

I'm just buying an ex-review Unison Research CDP to replace my year old Arcam CD192

Really? What's prompted this? I thought you were happy with the 192, and what about the rack! Or is it a money making venture?

 

[JoelSim]

My CD192 is 13 months old and therefore has 3 years and 11 months of warranty remaining, all recent Arcams come with 5 years.

Chris, I love the Arcam but the missus wants Spotify so I need a CDP with an optical input, and so I need to upgrade. I'm just buying a Unison Research Unico CDE, so have just listed my CD192 on fleabay.

It will just about fit on the top of the rack. Really just. And we are planning on moving so I'm going to reduce the box count and change the rack over the coming year or two.