If you primarily plan to listen to CDs, then you don't need an SACD player. Any time one makes a machine capable of playing multiple formats, COMPROMISES to both have to be made. The idea of upsampling CD to DSD as an improvement is dubious.
I used to own a Sony SCD-1 (I gave it away to a friend) and replaced it with a very, very good CD player. Given the vastly greater availability of CD material, really topnotch CD reproduction was much more important to me (the better SACD and DVD-A machines did not do much for me as CD players). But, I actually find that a surprising amount of good classical releases are on double layer SACDs, so, a classical listener can find quite a bit on SACD (I've actually bought more SACDs during the time I did not own an SACD machine than during the time I had the Sony).
As for whether the difference between the two can be heard, to me, the difference is easy to hear on machines with dual capability and usually in favor of SACD. But, when a really good SACD player is matched against a really good dedicated CD player, the strengths of the particular CD player can outweigh the inherent advantages of the SACD format.
I used to own a Sony SCD-1 (I gave it away to a friend) and replaced it with a very, very good CD player. Given the vastly greater availability of CD material, really topnotch CD reproduction was much more important to me (the better SACD and DVD-A machines did not do much for me as CD players). But, I actually find that a surprising amount of good classical releases are on double layer SACDs, so, a classical listener can find quite a bit on SACD (I've actually bought more SACDs during the time I did not own an SACD machine than during the time I had the Sony).
As for whether the difference between the two can be heard, to me, the difference is easy to hear on machines with dual capability and usually in favor of SACD. But, when a really good SACD player is matched against a really good dedicated CD player, the strengths of the particular CD player can outweigh the inherent advantages of the SACD format.