High End DVD Players as a Transport.. should we ignore them?

[Rockchild]

Some high end DVD players of some years back were the bees knees if I remember and well before blu ray but like anything, they get cast aside with new technology. There are some really decent models out there for little money and with digital outputs so, if you have a decent DAC, how do they fair against cd transports which can cost the earth.. 

Whats your options?
Do you use one? Have you used one? 

 

[MartinC]

I have used a cheap DVD player as a CD transport in the past and the biggest issue vs an actual CD transport was that it was much slower to load a disc and start playing. 

 

[Rockchild]

I have used a cheap DVD player as a CD transport in the past and the biggest issue vs an actual CD transport was that it was much slower to load a disc and start playing. 

Is that a fair trade off if these players like above are £50-£100? 

 

[MartinC]

Is that a fair trade off if these players like above are £50-£100? 

It depends how impatient someone is  .  Equally higher spec DVD players may well be faster. Just sharing an experience.

 

[Rockchild]

It depends how impatient someone is  .  Equally higher spec DVD players may well be faster. Just sharing an experience.

True… I suppose we need a £1000 cd transport vs one of these DVD players.  I have a Copland DAC and it’s pretty remarkable and I don’t hear the difference between my streamer and a Denon professional CDP through it. 

 

[Nopiano]

Is that a fair trade off if these players like above are £50-£100? 

Probably.  I bought my Oppo with the aim of trying it as a transport, but it’s fine on its own, if not as energetic as my Marantz.  But both are dramatically tardier at loading than a 30 year old CD player, which is disappointing.  And the displays are dull and smalll. Early players were much more user friendly, if not so sleek as today’s offering.  

 

[JamieMcC]

I use my a Oppo 205 as a transport into my Dave via optical.  SACD capability is handy. I can also use the Oppo as a Roon bridge streaming wireless to it then into the Dave instead of Room Rock server direct into Dave via USA. 

Red book cd definitely still has a sonic edge over streaming imho.

 

[Rockchild]

Well I just got one of these for not a lot. Will give it a go. 
Was thinking of buying a full and final high end CDP but given the DAC I’ve got, would be a waste possibility. 

 

[Lawrence001]

I've always tended to find that the sound out of a CDP/DVDP as a transport has many of the characteristics of the sound though the it's DAC.  I don't know why, maybe there's more to to digital section, case/feet etc than you'd expect.

I had a couple of Denon SACD/DVD players, one was a 3910 I think, and I found the sound too laid back from both analogue and digital.

 

[Cable Monkey]

I’ve been a fan of DVD players, or more accurately Universal Disk players for a while. They can be excellent but there are trade offs.

1. Universal players by definition play multiple formats and need to cycle through the various formats until it can read the disk. Hence being slow to play CD’s. They will often look for DVD, DVD-A and SACD before CD.

2. These machines are invariably clocked for 48k while the most common audio formats are part of the 41k family. 

3. Mixing audio and video capability can be problematic, especially when poorly thought through. One player I owned improved when it’s SCART board was disconnected. The original Japanese/US design had no SCART so wasn’t affected. 
 

Streamers have all but rendered Universal players redundant for audio. But a streamer is still a transport, even if it has no moving parts. No transport results in no sound!

 

[Rockchild]

I’ve been a fan of DVD players, or more accurately Universal Disk players for a while. They can be excellent but there are trade offs.

1. Universal players by definition play multiple formats and need to cycle through the various formats until it can read the disk. Hence being slow to play CD’s. They will often look for DVD, DVD-A and SACD before CD.

2. These machines are invariably clocked for 48k while the most common audio formats are part of the 41k family. 

3. Mixing audio and video capability can be problematic, especially when poorly thought through. One player I owned improved when it’s SCART board was disconnected. The original Japanese/US design had no SCART so wasn’t affected. 
 

Streamers have all but rendered Universal players redundant for audio. But a streamer is still a transport, even if it has no moving parts. No transport results in no sound!

When I eventually get my new room sorted, I’ll be able to have a play with the pioneer one more room to decorate before I’m ‘allowed’ to start on it. 
 

 

[Rockchild]

The other point is, I do have a number of discs you can’t stream and given the DACs performance, I don’t see the point of investing anymore in a CDP. When I’m ready, I have a loaner Audiolab 6000t to compare. Nothing ventured nothing gained as they say. 
I’ve always been convinced that it’s the DAC and it’s output stage that brings the maximum sonic gains.. if I’m wrong, I’m open to hear opinions

 

[hifinutt]

i find DVD players often have drive noise , cant stand it. players should be deadly silent in motion in my opinion. especially noticeable listening to classical 

 

[Rockchild]

i find DVD players often have drive noise , cant stand it. players should be deadly silent in motion in my opinion. especially noticeable listening to classical 

I don’t disagree but I think a lot depends on what you pay too. 

 

[hifinutt]

i have not heard a single dvd player which does not have some drive noise . even many sacd players do 

 

[Klassik]

Klassik has been using DVD/Blu-Ray drives for quite some time.  This is not as a transport, but rather as standalone CD/SACD players.  Here are a few things to keep in mind when evaluating a DVD/Blu-Ray player for CD usage either as a player or transport:

• What @hifinutt said above about many DVD/Blu-Ray players producing drive noise is true.  Some are worse than others though and some are virtually silent.  It really depends on the drive.  It seems to ole' Klassik that newer players are worse in this regard than older DVD players from the late 1990s/early 2000s.  Klassik reckons that newer D/B players read the CD at some speed higher than 1x and then buffers the playback.  This could possibly have some read-back benefits, Klassik knows not, but the sound might prove annoying.  Klassik has a late 1990s Mitsubishi DVD player made by Toshiba, quite a high-end model for the time, and it's virtually silent.  The early 2010s Sony Blu-Ray player isn't bad with the noise, but it isn't completely silent either.  The late 2000s Pioneer DVD player is quite loud.
  
• What @MartinC said about slower load times is also true.  Klassik sees this as being more of an issue with Blu-Ray players than older DVD players.  The issue isn't just the time it takes the drive to read the TOC, but also the time it takes the player to turn on and get into a usable state.  Of course, we're talking about relatively small amounts of time...less than a minute in most cases unless one has a Blu-ray player that needs to run an update or something.  :doh:
  
• It seems to ole' Klassik that older DVD players were designed to also be used as CD players.  Newer players may play CDs, but they weren't specifically designed to do so.  This leads to some of what Klassik will discuss below.
  
• Many DVD players and Blu-Ray players do not have front panel buttons for all transport actions such as fast forward and 'rewind'.  This has to be done on via the remote.  Also, some newer DVD players and Blu-Ray players do not have a front panel display or a very good front panel display.  Klassik prefers a nice, big display showing the track number and track play counter, but not all players will have this and even some that do will have very small displays.
  
• On the topic of 'rewind' and 'fast forward', many D/B players, especially newer ones, have these functions that act like a video rewind/FF and not like an audio one.  Thus, moving forward can be very slow and coarse.
  
• It seems to ole' Klassik that some newer Blu-Ray players, and even some newer standalone CD players, might not be fully Red Book compatible.  Of course, one can't expect anything modern to support track indexes and such like that, but it seems that some newer players don't even support proper de-emphasis or gapless playback between tracks.  :doh:   Of course, if one is using an outboard DAC which does not support these, Klassik reckons it's already a problem anyway regardless of what the transport does.
  

So those are a lot of negatives, but Klassik does find some DVD/Blu-Ray players to be very good CD players.  It's certainly a very good way to go and some of those older DVD and even Blu-Ray players are real beasts. 

 

[Gazjam]

Playing CDs into a Dac ya say?

Happy owner of an Audiolab 6000CDT transport, hooked up to my Dac over Spdif.
Astonishing bit of kit,
Bettered my heavily modded Oppo 203 for CD playback, my "Final Disk PLayer" (NOPE!)
It sounds unnatural and Hifi compared to the Audiolab, and thats with about a grands worth of upgrades.

Precision tool to do one job, very well.
Highly Highly recommended.

Its made CDs exciting again,
to the point where I sourced some Taiyo Yuden CDRs and burning my favourite albums onto CD, just so I can hear them through the Audiolab.

Run mine with PS Audio gear,
And I never feel as if its masking anything, this thing hits WAY above its price point.

 

[bencat]

The other point is, I do have a number of discs you can’t stream and given the DACs performance, I don’t see the point of investing anymore in a CDP. When I’m ready, I have a loaner Audiolab 6000t to compare. Nothing ventured nothing gained as they say. 
I’ve always been convinced that it’s the DAC and it’s output stage that brings the maximum sonic gains.. if I’m wrong, I’m open to hear opinions

Sorry this puzzled me what discs can you not stream ? There has so far not been any disc I have not been able to rip and add v to my library so would like to hear what your problem discs are.

 

[MartinC]

Streaming to many (most?) means from the likes of Qobuz...