Oppo BDP-105 vs Marantz SA-8004, Oppo how I wish I loved you but...

nspindel

I play a lot of vinyl, but on the digital side I'm primarily a Squeezebox guy. For a while I ran my Squeezebox Touch with several different standalone DACs, but a few years ago I read such great reviews of the Marantz SA-8004 SACD player. They were basically saying it sounded as good as most standalone dacs in the low $4-figures, that it was like getting a great dac for a steal at $1000, and you get SACD playback for free. So I picked up the Marantz and tried it head to head with the DAC2 and actually liked the Marantz more as a DAC for the Squeezebox, and as the reviews said, now I had an SACD player for free. In fact, I made a few hundred on the deal after I sold the W4S.

But the notion of an all-in-one player over a dedicated SACD player was appealing, so I recently purchased a BDP-105 from Paul (hochpt21) so that I could audition the 2-channel playback quality compared to the Marantz. I will soon be forced to add video playback to my hifi and I would love a single player, but I'm not willing to sacrifice sound quality for 2-channel music playback. If the Oppo could measure up, I would part ways with the Marantz and keep the Oppo, otherwise I'd resell it.

I admit to not being overly scientific in my listening tests, nor very sophisticated. In this case, it was fairly simple. I have two pairs of identical interconnects (Signal Analog Two) and two identical power cords (Signal Magic Power Digitial Reference) for the Oppo and the Marantz, and just plugged them both in as different inputs to my tube pre-amp (Dared MC-7P), and then listened through my SDA 4.1TL's powered by my Krell KAV2250.

I listened to bits of four SACDs in my testing. Alison Kraus + Union Station Live, the Audio Fidelity version of Rush Counterparts, the Allman Brothers Eat A Peach, and Mark Knopfler Shangri-la. Again, nothing overly scientific, just listening to a few tracks from each disc flipping back and forth between the two players trying to get a feel for the differences between the two.

In each case, the results were the same. To my old ears, the Marantz wins. The Oppo is great, don't get me wrong, but the Marantz just kills! It was a bit difficult doing the test because the Marantz has more gain, so I had to tweak the volume each time to compensate between the two players. But once I got the hang of the differences between the two, I could make the adjustments before I even began playing.

All I can say is there's just more "oomph" to the sound of the Marantz. Bass guitar has more grunt to it. Hi-hats and cymbals seem to float out of thin air with a more pronounced sound. Drum rolls were more precise. Guitars and pianos sounded incredibly dynamic with the Marantz and a bit more subdued with the Oppo.

I really wish I liked the Oppo more, it's such a great unit. Built like a tank, plays everything you could want to throw at it, and would be a great bridge between 2-channel digital listening versus multi-channel playback. And it does sound great. Just..... not as great as the Marantz.

Of course, ymmv, but my ears decided that I'll be passing the Oppo along shortly. The Marantz is the keeper.

[Deleted User]

So, how much for the Oppo?

Thorton

Nothing wrong with that. At least you tried it to listen to the differences. It would be nice if only 1 box was needed for all of our needs. This is usually not the case. Everyone prefers different sound characteristics, that's why there's some many products available and our wallets are so light.

F1nut

I'm not surprised.

AsSiMiLaTeD

I think where the Oppo wins is soundstage, particularly where a larger open soundstage is needed. To my ears the Marantz has better PRaT which most music benefits from. The Oppo has a wider and more open soundstage, which is really nice for larger more complex music like classical and movie scores but you do lose some impact that a more 'intimate' soundstage would offer.

Throw some larger complex music at both players and see what you think, if you have the popular Tchaikovsky Festival album the first track, Marche Slave, is a good demo track. People I've talked to have heard things the same way I do, but will be curious to see what you think.

[Deleted User]

on the heels of that I would toss on
The Cramps "Bad music for Bad People"
but that's just me...

[Deleted User]

This is good information but sadly I have a DAC.
Thanks for posting!

tonyb

Interesting comments. I've always known the Marantz was a great player with great build to it, but this is the first time I've heard someone describe the OPPO 105's lower bass as being subdued.

gudnoyez

But for use in a double duty HT system are you really worried about subdued Bass? The application you are using the Marantz in is Ideal and the Oppo should not even be considered. That being said I would love to own that SA 8004 or the newer model for my 2 channel rig.

drumminman

Nice comparison. My experience is a little different re: bass in that I've not found the 105 to be bass shy. Also, I've found the sound stage to be both wide and deep as mentioned above. My 105 pulls amazing detail out of both redbook and sacd.

Congrats on finding a great player.

Moose68Bash

Nice review. Thank you.

One question: How many hours did you have on the Oppo before the A/B comparisons?

I've found that the DACs I have used really needed to be burned in. The PS Audio PerfectWave and DirectStream DACs I have started using over the past few months have taken up to or beyond 200 hours to really open up and show their capabilities and characteristics.

Just curious.

nspindel

rednedtugent wrote: »

So, how much for the Oppo?

I'll post it for sale in the flea market in the near future. Not going to talk prices outside of a flea market thread, sorry.

nspindel

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

I think where the Oppo wins is soundstage, particularly where a larger open soundstage is needed. To my ears the Marantz has better PRaT which most music benefits from. The Oppo has a wider and more open soundstage, which is really nice for larger more complex music like classical and movie scores but you do lose some impact that a more 'intimate' soundstage would offer.

Throw some larger complex music at both players and see what you think, if you have the popular Tchaikovsky Festival album the first track, Marche Slave, is a good demo track. People I've talked to have heard things the same way I do, but will be curious to see what you think.

I'm going to try a Yo Yo Ma sacd, I just ran out of time last night. But I can't agree that the Oppo wins on soundstage. I'm not putting the Oppo down at all, it's a great unit, but the Marantz sound stage is just killer. I found no area where the Oppo outperformed the Marantz when it came to 2-channel sound quality.

nspindel

tonyb wrote: »

Interesting comments. I've always known the Marantz was a great player with great build to it, but this is the first time I've heard someone describe the OPPO 105's lower bass as being subdued.

Actually I didn't say the lower bass was subdued. I said that guitars and piano sound a bit subdued versus the Marantz. I just felt like at equivalent listening volumes, those string instruments were jumping out of the speakers more with the Marantz. The Marantz just gave a bigger, fuller, more aggressive sound.

nspindel

gudnoyez wrote: »

But for use in a double duty HT system are you really worried about subdued Bass? The application you are using the Marantz in is Ideal and the Oppo should not even be considered. That being said I would love to own that SA 8004 or the newer model for my 2 channel rig.

Basically, that's what I needed to demonstrate for myself. With all the great audiophile reviews of the Oppo, I had hoped it could equal the sound of the single-purpose Marantz. It did come close, but it could not equal it. At some point maybe I will grab a lower-line Oppo for the video functionality, but it won't be the 105 where you're paying the premium for the better sound quality.

nspindel

Moose68Bash wrote: »

Nice review. Thank you.

One question: How many hours did you have on the Oppo before the A/B comparisons?

I've found that the DACs I have used really needed to be burned in. The PS Audio PerfectWave and DirectStream DACs I have started using over the past few months have taken up to or beyond 200 hours to really open up and show their capabilities and characteristics.

Just curious.

I didn't have any hours on the Oppo at all when I started testing, but I'm the second owner, so it's had some time to break in.

nspindel

Actually I've just gone ahead and listed the Oppo in the flea market, here's the thread:

http://forum.polkaudio.com/discussion/164262/for-sale-oppo-bdp-105

AsSiMiLaTeD

nspindel wrote: »

I'm going to try a Yo Yo Ma sacd, I just ran out of time last night. But I can't agree that the Oppo wins on soundstage. I'm not putting the Oppo down at all, it's a great unit, but the Marantz sound stage is just killer. I found no area where the Oppo outperformed the Marantz when it came to 2-channel sound quality.

Well that's why we have different options for gear because we all hear things differently I guess. The other gear in our rigs likely plays a role as well. I've had several others listen to those same two players on my rig and have the same impressions as I did, though some to lesser and higher degrees. That was also the general consensus at LSAF earlier this year where I had both players. The Oppo has slightly less impact to the sound but a wider soundstage, maybe this was more apparent since I run my Magnepans which do struggle with really complex music and that extra bit of soundstage width helps 'untangle' the sound some.

cnh

I still haven't heard the newer, higher end Oppos, but I have had my ears on the Marantz and that is a great player in that price range so I, too, am not surprised that it can hold its own and more. But I do still need to here the Opa! before I can say anything there-I will say that the Oppo (I can't help but refer to it as Opa!, though) has improved greatly since the first unit and the newer units have even "better" construction, are heavier and seem to be a "quality" product.

cnh

nspindel

Of course, it should be noted that the Marantz SA8005 was noted to be a good improvement over my 8004.

gudnoyez

I will sell either my Marantz CD 5003 or CD 5004 so I can get a SA8005 how much of a difference is there between the 8005 and the 8004? I have seen pretty good deals on accessories 4 less on the 8004, but for a couple of hundred more I could get the 8005 New.

voltz

I have the 8005 sacd player and I love it big time its my DAC also as I run my music files from my PC to it using JRiver Media. plus lots of features like:

Both the front panel USB "Type A" input and the rear panel USB "Type B" input support 24-bit files. The rear panel USB-B port works in asynchronous mode and capable of handling PCM up to 192kHz/24bits and DSD2.8 & 5.6Mhz direct streaming. In addition to your iPod and iPhone files, you can "push" high definition digital music files from your computer to the SA8005. The SA8005 also accepts data from any USB stick or USB hard drive storage device.

The SA8005 includes two rear-panel digital outputs. These outputs provide an S/PDIF signal even when the USB input is receiving iTunes music files.

http://www.audioadvisor.com/prodinfo.asp?number=MASA8005

gudnoyez

http://www.accessories4less.com/make-a-store/item/marsa8005/marantz-sa8005-super-audio-cd-player-dac/1.html

I guess there is a reason for these being sold out good price I would add 2 years, to the warranty and its still a good price. I love my Oppo 105D in my HT rig but would love one of these in my 2 channel rig.

voltz

yep, excellent price there.

tonyb

I wonder how the 105 and the Parasound P5 together would be. Think about it, for 2 g's you get a system for both HT/2 channel, processing and 2 different dacs at your disposal. Betcha they'd sound awesome together.

voltz

That is a very good point!

[Deleted User]

Ding Ding. This is exactly where I'm headed, though a couple of moves down stream..

tonyb wrote: »

I wonder how the 105 and the Parasound P5 together would be. Think about it, for 2 g's you get a system for both HT/2 channel, processing and 2 different dacs at your disposal. Betcha they'd sound awesome together.

Upstatemax

Glad to hear that you still like your current gear!

Sad to hear that your not in love with the Oppo! It's a battle for me, I would love to get my ears on some of the Marantz gear but I have sworn them off and I can't bring myself to drop my $$ on them anymore...

It's seems that you've had good reliability from your 8004 Neil?

nspindel

The 8004 has been perfect Frank. Excellent machine.

Upstatemax

Damn you Neil! You're supposed to tell me that it's been awful...

I don't like it when the gears in my head start spinning. Then they start to justify purchases that get me in trouble with the wifey.

AsSiMiLaTeD

I would still encourage anyone looking at these players to audition both. While each player has it's strengths I do not agree that the Marantz is better in every respect, and several people at LSAF a few months ago agreed with me. I'm not saying I'm right, just that an actual audition is recommended.