Why CD players so expensive when the fomat is dead

IMO ,"DEAD" is an over exaggeration by the poster.It makes no sense to pay 1000s of dollars for a CD/SACD player these days when high quality download is available.Thats how I read the post which I agree with

First of all, well engineered CDs sound great.

Second of all, CD is not dead but is declining in both sales and in daily usage. Personally, I buy my own CDs then rip to FLAC. But, I am pretty sure everyone I know download their music from iTunes or some other site. They either don't like the form factor or think it's not "cool" to use CDs anymore.

Third, I think a properly implemented PC based system can sound as good or better than a megabuck CD player for a fraction of the cost since the CD medium do have more demons to deal with.

So, it doesn't awe me a bit that CD player prices are so high. They simply have to be overbuilt to perform as good or better than LP and PC/MAC based systems.

As for myself, I will continue to buy CDs as my main method in building my digital music library to play in my CD-less hifi.

Realremo- the example you provide is exactly what one would expect to see when bridging from one technology to the next. Of course you are going to rip your CDs- but in the future iTunes and the like which get their samples from the master tapes directly are going to completely kill the CD. In addition- out of print music like the example you give will become more accessible because the economics of creating a manufacturing run of less than mainstream music onto a CD will not come into play. You dont need to worry about needing to sell x to break even as much because the costs are soo much lower to simply get the song on a server! Music wont go "out of print" because there is nothing to print!

CDs are antiquated only multiple levels and the writing is absolutely on the wall.

I agree the format is dying, but I wouldn't quite call it dead. The reason CDs remain relevant is that the amount of data on a CD still far exceeds that of a typical download.

As technology improves and all the detail of a CD or SACD becomes common to downloadable files, the CD medium will become obsolete and, with it, our big-rig CD players.

This does not mean that the rest of the system becomes obsolete - good wires, amps, speakers, set-up, placement, and all that stuff will still matter just as much. The box where the CD player now sits will merely look a little different. And, it will require regular backup.

For now, though, I would not call the CD format obsolete.

cd is not dead