Best Tube CDP for $2000 Budget

have not heard the Unison. look forward to the 4 tube prima luna. I thought the cayin SACD and the Cayin 17 were built on close specs. So i figured they would sound 'similiar". I had the stock chinese 6922's rolled to Sovtek ( $150/quad)and made a nice tweak + the 4 opamps(labor + parts $200 I think) changed, which gave me another nice improvement. I'll lookmat your review of the Melody. I'm sure its a fine player, as is all their gear. As a audio reviewer you should consider the Cayin 17 in your next review. There may be better out there for same $, but I'm happy and will upgrade the caps to Mundorf's Silver in oil ($300+)

Mrtennis, why even mention Primaluna when they do not even have a web site????????????? Just forget it. "all players sound about the same"....Not true. Also reliability is of extreme importantce in cdp's.

05-06-07: Bartokfan
Mrtennis, why even mention Primaluna when they do not even have a web site?

PrimaLuna is pretty well known to be distributed by Kevin Deal of Upscale Audio. The brand is featured every month in a big glossy Stereophile ad. This is not a brand that's hard to miss.

The upcoming CD player is getting strong industry buzz.

Also reliability is of extreme importantce in cdp's.
Bartokfan (Threads | Answers)

This quote is from the Upscale website regarding PrimaLuna products:

Dependability. PrimaLuna sells—worldwide, not just in the United States—and we have almost zero repairs. Service issues can make a line unprofitable very quickly. In our roughly three years, we simply haven’t experienced that problem.

PrimaLuna.

let me ask some of you guys, does a photo of the guts of a player mean anything important to you?
I realize its not possible to tell exactly how a player will sound from a photo, but you at least see some of the build quality.

How do you define build quality? Parts manufacture? Neatness of the installation?

I have owned a couple of really excellent sounding components that had rats nest installations, so neatness of the installation wouldn't apply to the quality of the component in this case.

I assume parts are selected for how they sound together. I know of a few builders who use parts that are not the most expensive available because they prefer how the parts contribute to the sound of the unit as a whole. So, looking at the parts content of these components would not tell the story of how the component sounds.

IMO, laymen looking under the hood is fairly useless, and having a surface knowledge of "high end" audiophile parts can be just enough knowledge to get someone into trouble by incorrectly prejudging a component's sound.

I can see how someone who has first hand experience building gear would have an advantage judging a component based on a photo of the guts. However, that's still no guarantee.

So, seeing a photo of the insides of a component means little to me because I've heard great gear that looked like crap on the inside, and I've heard not-so-great gear that would have received an A+ for neatness.

YMMV...