Universal Players vs. Dedicated CD/SACD Players

Found something better than the Sony Modwright XA5400ES...The Kell Cipher!  It's da bomb Dadeo...like, far out man..yeah!!

Agree that the Cipher is an outstanding player.  Hope you have a sturdy rack - that thing is a monster!

jafant, the Nad C565BEE is indeed a fine spinner! I’d forgotten to try the Sample Rate Converter with compressed files. With the Nad, they don’t sound compressed at all, the air and detail has me grinning from ear to ear. By comparison, the Oppo 95 could sound somewhat tinny or one dimensional with mp3’s.

But with redbook, the Oppo still lags behind what this Nad can do as well. They were pretty close to the same price back in 2011 when I was looking, but the 565 wasn’t even on my radar as Oppo was all everyone was talking about. I didn’t need or want a bluray player, I just wanted something for cds.

Don’t get me wrong, the Oppo does a lot of things well, but I think I agree with you that they are not the last word in audio quality.

 An interesting thread.  I have an Oppo 105 in my two channel system that I don't use for video at all.  I play many SACDS, a few DCD-A and Blu Ray Audio and DTS Audios
and some High Res downloads but primarily it's Red Book CD.
   It's a highly resolving piece of equipment.  I have had some problem with glare (I started another thread on this) and I think it may be a function of some poorly recorded or transferred CDs; I think the player is just revealing the inadequacy of those particular recordings.
   I have an older Universal Player in an HT System but it's a Pioneer Elite that has an "i link"--a firewire connection to a matching Pioneer Elite receiver.  Amazing audio, but the video is horribly outdated, as someone else noted upthread.

Thanks! for sharing- guys.

I would not mind getting a demo on the Krell EVO or Cipher spinner myself!