Electrocompaniet EMC II CD Player

Swampwalker, I experimented with exactly what you mentioned...two
times (once with an HT Truthlink XLR>RCA cable, and a second time
with XLR>RCA adapters). The first attempt resulted in a hum, which I
couldn't eliminate no matter how many cheater plugs I used. The
second attempt worked fine, but it was after the EMC 1-UP had been
modded by Steve Nugent, and I could still tell the player sounded best
running truly balanced. When I switched to the XLR>RCA adapters the
sonics still didn't measure up. After the mod, the difference is very
small, but using the "cheater" cable doesn't provide the same
benefits as maintaining the XLR>XLR connection. Still, as has been
mentioned before, the results may vary from system to system, and it's
certainly worth a try. My Neutrik XLR>RCA adapters from Stu Wein at
Audioparts were very reasonably priced.

Swampwalker,

Thanks for the idea of the XLR/RCA interconnect. Somewhere along this thread or possibly in the "Pre-amp Deal of the Century" thread that focuses on Supratek pre-amps, someone had commented that they perceived no sonic difference between going RCA to RCA from the EMC-1 versus your idea of going XLR from the EMC-1 into an RCA in the pre-amp.

It would be great to do an A/B comparison where you between using an RCA/RCA and comparing that to your XLR/RCA idea. If you are in a position to try that experiment, it will be great to hear back from you.

Mike from Father & Son Audio mentioned in this thread that he would entertain a group deal.

Please do give us your comments when and if you install a Spider. Is your EMC-1 the UP version ? Have you done Steven Nugent’s mod ?

Thanks for your input.

Hi guys. Here's a weird corrolary. A Dane end-user posted his seemingly-older (it's hard to tell from the bad English) 240v EMC-1 on eBay, now sitting at $2225. I had thrown out a silly low bid early in the week just to track it automatically (calm down, Mike!). The bidding seems to be from other Europeans, as espected.
However, throughout the week I've received FOUR off-eBay and one "through eBay with commissions paid(??)" side offers to buy "NEW" or "similar" EMC-1s for "low" or "$2000" prices. These have all been from different addresses, each with DIFFERENTLY-flawed English. What the hell's going on here? The EMC-1 UP SE sells for $3k+ new in the EC...probably close to $4k with the low dollar, so I'm further perplexed. I DID delete these offers, so can't offer up the addresses to legitimate EC dealers to track down, if asked. Sorry.
Does anyone else run into this when seeing a high end component on eBay? Are there that many gray marketers out there?

On second thought I fear that the above-mentioned offers could be cons, as a couple of these emails stated that the seller was a "dealer" represented in many countries, etc., but happened to be in England at the time, blah blah blah, again all in very poorly spelled English. Truly weird....
I dragged my EMC-1 UP SE into a local friendly budget-high dealer (NAD, UNICO, ARCAM, TRIANGLE, ALON, CASTLE). Their VERY good tech uncovered it, remarking that all the decent discrete parts indicated great build design. We all listened to it, as the house guru and the tech's jaws dropped. They had never heard digital sound that good. $5500? Maybe not. But discounted/used $4/3k hard to resist.
There IS a lot of there there....
So am I being too cheap about the Spider? And yes, why isn't it standard now? Hmmm.... Are they hard to get because they work, or did EC make a few to test the high-profit accessory waters as a quasi-joke. Love to hear a pair of pre/post-Spidered EMC-1s side by side....
I have NO idea what Steve Nugent's doing, but $1400 is a LOT to spend on these circuit boards. OTOH replacing all the power diodes ($20 parts) DOES make a significant improvement, so maybe swapping out some caps, etc., is a good idea too. What ARE you doing for all that money, Steve?

I tried the XLR to RCA adapter thing and perceived no difference between it and straight RCA to RCA. My pre is a Supratek Syrah. It is possible that there was a slight audible difference that I did not appreciate as I was not overly patient in assessing the adapter setup. I've also heard the EMC in another setup using both straight XLR and straight RCA and while I perceived a sonic improvement with XLR, I was not motivated to dump my Syrah.

My intentions are to first purchase and listen to the Spider on my EMC and then, at a later date, have Steve Nugent install his transport mods only. Not sure if I'll go for the full blown mods at this time.