A few years back I did a comparison of a Cambridge Audio CD player (800 series I think) and a PS Audio memory player. The PS Audio was far superior in my mind so I sold the Cambridge Audio. I firmly believe that stripping digital byte by byte in a CDROM drive, and then using the right digital to analog playback of the error free, bit perfect music file will always be better than the best "real time" digital streaming (actually analog streaming of digital data) in an old school Redbook transport. And cheaper too, as the exotic techniques to maintain disc rotational speeds, vibration control, and laser reflection and refraction are not needed in a CDROM, as compared with a high end CD transport. The on the fly error correction algorithms employed in most CD transports are also unnecessary, as a CDROM can read or re-read the CD as necessary to obtain an error free bit perfect copy.
My experience with my CD collection bears this out, as the ripped files (using dBPoweramp as I went to a Bryston BDP) have never sounded better, and I hear things that I thought were missing in the CD pressing, but actually were there all the time and are clearly audible in the ripped files. So I cannot see a real reason to keep making CD transports, and this is born out in the trends where all the high volume mass produced transports are ceasing production.
My experience with my CD collection bears this out, as the ripped files (using dBPoweramp as I went to a Bryston BDP) have never sounded better, and I hear things that I thought were missing in the CD pressing, but actually were there all the time and are clearly audible in the ripped files. So I cannot see a real reason to keep making CD transports, and this is born out in the trends where all the high volume mass produced transports are ceasing production.