Redefining "Universal Player"

I was under the impression that the term universal player described a unit that played all sliver disc formats, i.e. CD, SACD, DVD-A, CD-R (etc.), and now Blu-Ray.

I never thought it had anything to do with having a digital input.

Why would a source component have a digital input? I can understand a digital output, but the digital input requirement has me puzzled.

Tvad, you look at a digital output as understandable, because it is a transport which could use an external DAC. To others, a multi-silver-disc-playing box with an excellent DAC can be used as an external DAC when the next new silver disc or "transport" technology comes along (like BlueRayII or a HDD- or memory-based server).

T-Bone, is there any commercially made universal player produced in the past five years that has a digital input? I'm thinking specifically about the players from the major companies: Sony, Panasonic, Marantz, Denon, etc.?

Do the universal players from Ayre or Esoteric have digital inputs?

My universal player has a digital input, but only because it's a modded player that has an optional digital input available as part of the modification.

I agree it's handy.

I've also never owned a player with a digital input and don't understand the expectation for one. They are certainly the exception rather than the rule, and I can only think of a few off the top of my head that actually offer that option. If you are looking for the ultimate conversion the obvious solution is to get an external DAC with its own power supply, rather than a DAC sharing the box and power supply with the transport. In doing this you can simply plug in the next latest greatest format when it comes out. The newer DACs like the Berkley Alpha are sure to keep up with anything you're likely to find to feed to it. The only reason I could see for wanting to use the internal DAC of a player (assuming you like it of course) is the convenience of using a single box for memory-based playback and disk-based playback. I suppose it's one less set of IC's (or digital cord) and one less PC to purchase and deal with as well.

I am looking for high-quality conversion for a music server, with the ability to play the occassional SACD, DVD or Blu-Ray, and newly purchased CD without ripping it to my music server. I agree, Kr4, that if there is a pre/pro in the system, you can use a digital input and its internal DACs, but my goal would be to get the pre/pro out of the system. In my LR, space is limited, and I have an excellent setup for 2-channel sound, but I'm perfectly content with 2-channel movie playback and therefore don't need all the pre/pro functionality.

There are several examples of high-end, multi-format players with digital inputs. Simaudio, Linn and Wadia all provide players that do at least SACD and Redbook, plus a digital in, and the Linn SC does them all (minus Blu-Ray) with digital in. Esoteric and Ayre do not make players with digital inputs.

I would think a digital input would be one of the least expensive "formats" to support - no licensing, etc. - and provides a level of flexibility that many would want. In my case (and I'm sure others'), I would like to keep box count as low as possible, sound quality as high as possible, cost as low as possible, and flexibility as high as possible. Okay, I want it all :-)