Inexplicably good sound - El Cheapo Player?!
jbreezy5
Posts: 1,141
I picked up a Sony DVP-NC85H 5-disc dvd/cd carousel player a few months ago at a Goodwill ($9), cleaned it up last night and tossed it in my bedroom system and am listening to it now.
BR system: B&K Ref 5 S2 Preamp & 125.2 S2 amp / Monitor Audio Silver 1 / REL HT1003 / Jolida Tube Dac III, and above-mentioned player as transport running coax to the dac.
Much to my chagrin the player is mechanically noisy, but only heard at all during very quiet passages, like occurs in classical music.
But the music this thing transmits is blowing me away! Instrumental timbres and separation of instruments, depth of stage, bass pitch/power are all magnificent.
Keep in mind I’ve been dragging my feet on forking over the dough to purchase a quality CDP for some time now, and have recently made ventures into SACD.
I certainly never expected to obtain the sound quality I’m getting from this thing; just bought it to fool around, and maybe trade-in for CDs somewhere. This machine, sonically, is no joke in this set-up; I was using the Denon DVD-1940ci (also mechanically noisy and good-sounding for a low-end player) for CD/SACD.
I’m not sure if I would like the Sony if run from it’s own internal DAC and L/R, but man, as a transport, it is shockingly good. I do like it for CDs better than the Denon, of which I’m a fanboy of their higher models (i.e. 2910/3910, 2930/3930).
I’ve found the Sony to be transparent enough to be able to distinguish quality recordings from poor ones.
Rush Chronicles left me wanting quality-wise as usual, Uriah Heep Look At Yourself excellent, RCA Red Seals sound superb, then…
Most mind-blowingly of all:
Metallica …and Justice for All, sounded soooo ridiculously good. This is notoriously a dreadful recording, and I have previously only loved it for its musicianship, but there was clarity and separation and dimensionality, and truth of timbre/texture. The best I’ve heard this album sound. Hence this review.
Maybe I’m crazy, but if you’re in the market for a cheap player, maybe you find one at a thrift too and give it a shot.
Oh, I ordered a remote on the auction site. It is RMT-D176A for this unit.
Cheers!
BR system: B&K Ref 5 S2 Preamp & 125.2 S2 amp / Monitor Audio Silver 1 / REL HT1003 / Jolida Tube Dac III, and above-mentioned player as transport running coax to the dac.
Much to my chagrin the player is mechanically noisy, but only heard at all during very quiet passages, like occurs in classical music.
But the music this thing transmits is blowing me away! Instrumental timbres and separation of instruments, depth of stage, bass pitch/power are all magnificent.
Keep in mind I’ve been dragging my feet on forking over the dough to purchase a quality CDP for some time now, and have recently made ventures into SACD.
I certainly never expected to obtain the sound quality I’m getting from this thing; just bought it to fool around, and maybe trade-in for CDs somewhere. This machine, sonically, is no joke in this set-up; I was using the Denon DVD-1940ci (also mechanically noisy and good-sounding for a low-end player) for CD/SACD.
I’m not sure if I would like the Sony if run from it’s own internal DAC and L/R, but man, as a transport, it is shockingly good. I do like it for CDs better than the Denon, of which I’m a fanboy of their higher models (i.e. 2910/3910, 2930/3930).
I’ve found the Sony to be transparent enough to be able to distinguish quality recordings from poor ones.
Rush Chronicles left me wanting quality-wise as usual, Uriah Heep Look At Yourself excellent, RCA Red Seals sound superb, then…
Most mind-blowingly of all:
Metallica …and Justice for All, sounded soooo ridiculously good. This is notoriously a dreadful recording, and I have previously only loved it for its musicianship, but there was clarity and separation and dimensionality, and truth of timbre/texture. The best I’ve heard this album sound. Hence this review.
Maybe I’m crazy, but if you’re in the market for a cheap player, maybe you find one at a thrift too and give it a shot.
Oh, I ordered a remote on the auction site. It is RMT-D176A for this unit.
Cheers!
CD Players: Sony CDP-211; Sony DVP-S9000ES; Sony UDP-X800M2 (x2); Cambridge Audio CXC
DACs: Jolida Glass FX Tube DAC III (x2); Denafrips Ares II (x2)
Streamers: ROKU (x3); Bluesound Node 2i and Node N130 w/LHY LPS // Receivers: Yamaha RX-V775BT; Yamaha RX-V777
Preamps: B&K Ref 50; B&K Ref 5 S2; Classe CP-800 MkII; Audio Research SP16L (soon)
Amps: Niles SI-275; B&K ST125.7; B&K ST125.2; Classe CA-2300; Butler Audio TDB-5150
Speakers: Boston Acoustics CR55; Focal Chorus 705v; Wharfedale Diamond 10.2; Monitor Audio Silver-1; Def Tech Mythos One (x4)/Mythos Three Center (x2)/Mythos Two pr.; Martin Logan Electromotion ESL; Legacy Audio Victoria/Silverscreen Center; Gallo Acoustics Reference 3.1; SVS SB-1000 Pro; REL HT-1003; B&W ASW610; HifiMan HE400i
Turntable: Dual 721 Direct-Drive w/Audio Technica AT-VM95e cart
Cables: Tripp-lite 14ga. PCs, Blue Jeans Cable ICs, Philips PXT1000 ICs; Kimber Kable DV30 coaxial ICs; Canare L-4E6S XLR ICs; Kimber Kable 8PR & 8TC speaker cables.
DACs: Jolida Glass FX Tube DAC III (x2); Denafrips Ares II (x2)
Streamers: ROKU (x3); Bluesound Node 2i and Node N130 w/LHY LPS // Receivers: Yamaha RX-V775BT; Yamaha RX-V777
Preamps: B&K Ref 50; B&K Ref 5 S2; Classe CP-800 MkII; Audio Research SP16L (soon)
Amps: Niles SI-275; B&K ST125.7; B&K ST125.2; Classe CA-2300; Butler Audio TDB-5150
Speakers: Boston Acoustics CR55; Focal Chorus 705v; Wharfedale Diamond 10.2; Monitor Audio Silver-1; Def Tech Mythos One (x4)/Mythos Three Center (x2)/Mythos Two pr.; Martin Logan Electromotion ESL; Legacy Audio Victoria/Silverscreen Center; Gallo Acoustics Reference 3.1; SVS SB-1000 Pro; REL HT-1003; B&W ASW610; HifiMan HE400i
Turntable: Dual 721 Direct-Drive w/Audio Technica AT-VM95e cart
Cables: Tripp-lite 14ga. PCs, Blue Jeans Cable ICs, Philips PXT1000 ICs; Kimber Kable DV30 coaxial ICs; Canare L-4E6S XLR ICs; Kimber Kable 8PR & 8TC speaker cables.
Comments
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Synergy man, synergy- Not Tom ::::::: Any system can play Diana Krall. Only the best can play Limp Bizkit.
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If it added the Bass that is lacking on Justice For All, then you might have found the right spinner.Home Theater
Parasound Halo A 31 OnkyoTX-NR838 Sony XBR55X850B 55" 4K RtiA9 Fronts CsiA6 Center RtiA3 Rears FxiA6 Side Surrounds Dual Psw 111's Oppo 105D Signal Ultra Speaker Cables & IC's Signal Magic Power Cable Technics SL Q300 Panamax MR4300 Audioquest Chocolate HDMI Cables Audioquest Forest USB Cable
2 Channel
Adcom 555II Vincent SA-T1 Marantz SA 15S2 Denon DR-M11 Clearaudio Bluemotion SDA 2.3tl's (Z) edition MIT Terminator II Speaker Cables & IC's Adcom 545II Adcom Gtp-450 Marantz CD5004 Technics M245X SDA 2B's, SDA CRS+
Stuff for the Head
JD LABS C5 Headphone Amplifier, Sennheiser HD 598, Polk Audio Buckle, Polk Audio Hinge, Velodyne vPulse, Bose IE2, Sennheiser CX 200 Street II, Sennheiser MX 365
Shower & Off the beaten path Rigs
Polk Audio Boom Swimmer, Polk Audio Urchin
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Interesting that you noticed such a big difference just using it as a transport.
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Interesting that you noticed such a big difference just using it as a transport.
Yeah, I had the same thought. That said, I have tried a couple different CD and DVD players' transports here with the Bryston DAC I acquired karmically from @BlueFox1 -- and some do seem to sound better than others.
Thus did I pick an unprepossessing, low end, dump find Denon DVDP for 'daily driver' use here as an audio CD player (transport).
BDA-1 plus DVD-1730 by Mark Hardy, on Flickr
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Maybe that's the key, DVD player as transport.
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mhardy6647 wrote: »Interesting that you noticed such a big difference just using it as a transport.
Yeah, I had the same thought. That said, I have tried a couple different CD and DVD players' transports here with the Bryston DAC I acquired karmically from @BlueFox1 -- and some do seem to sound better than others.
Thus did I pick an unprepossessing, low end, dump find Denon DVDP for 'daily driver' use here as an audio CD player (transport).BDA-1 plus DVD-1730 by Mark Hardy, on Flickr
Very similar to my dvd-1940ci in appearance. How is yours on mechanical noise? I believe someone else has same as me on this forum, but doesn’t find it noisy. I’m going to use mine for SACD only going forward
Maybe it was you. 😅😂🤣.CD Players: Sony CDP-211; Sony DVP-S9000ES; Sony UDP-X800M2 (x2); Cambridge Audio CXC
DACs: Jolida Glass FX Tube DAC III (x2); Denafrips Ares II (x2)
Streamers: ROKU (x3); Bluesound Node 2i and Node N130 w/LHY LPS // Receivers: Yamaha RX-V775BT; Yamaha RX-V777
Preamps: B&K Ref 50; B&K Ref 5 S2; Classe CP-800 MkII; Audio Research SP16L (soon)
Amps: Niles SI-275; B&K ST125.7; B&K ST125.2; Classe CA-2300; Butler Audio TDB-5150
Speakers: Boston Acoustics CR55; Focal Chorus 705v; Wharfedale Diamond 10.2; Monitor Audio Silver-1; Def Tech Mythos One (x4)/Mythos Three Center (x2)/Mythos Two pr.; Martin Logan Electromotion ESL; Legacy Audio Victoria/Silverscreen Center; Gallo Acoustics Reference 3.1; SVS SB-1000 Pro; REL HT-1003; B&W ASW610; HifiMan HE400i
Turntable: Dual 721 Direct-Drive w/Audio Technica AT-VM95e cart
Cables: Tripp-lite 14ga. PCs, Blue Jeans Cable ICs, Philips PXT1000 ICs; Kimber Kable DV30 coaxial ICs; Canare L-4E6S XLR ICs; Kimber Kable 8PR & 8TC speaker cables. -
mhardy6647 wrote: »Interesting that you noticed such a big difference just using it as a transport.
Yeah, I had the same thought. That said, I have tried a couple different CD and DVD players' transports here with the Bryston DAC I acquired karmically from @BlueFox1 -- and some do seem to sound better than others.
Thus did I pick an unprepossessing, low end, dump find Denon DVDP for 'daily driver' use here as an audio CD player (transport).BDA-1 plus DVD-1730 by Mark Hardy, on Flickr
Very similar to my dvd-1940ci in appearance. How is yours on mechanical noise? I believe someone else has same as me on this forum, but doesn’t find it noisy. I’m going to use mine for SACD only going forward
Maybe it was you. 😅😂🤣.
Very quiet.
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mhardy6647 wrote: »
Yeah, I had the same thought. That said, I have tried a couple different CD and DVD players' transports here with the Bryston DAC I acquired karmically from @BlueFox1 -- and some do seem to sound better than others.
A slight clarification. Back when Vanilla totally messed up many users so that they could no longer login I created BlueFox1 to access the forum. After contacting F1nut (Jesse) who managed to straighten things out for me, and others, I was able to again login as BlueFox.
Lumin X1 file player, Westminster Labs interconnect cable
Sony XA-5400ES SACD; Pass XP-22 pre; X600.5 amps
Magico S5 MKII Mcast Rose speakers; SPOD spikes
Shunyata Triton v3/Typhon QR on source, Denali 2000 (2) on amps
Shunyata Sigma XLR analog ICs, Sigma speaker cables
Shunyata Sigma HC (2), Sigma Analog, Sigma Digital, Z Anaconda (3) power cables
Mapleshade Samson V.3 four shelf solid maple rack, Micropoint brass footers
Three 20 amp circuits. -
Derp! Sorry about that! I had forgotten the genesis of that imbroglio
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This thread reminds me that the Pioneer DVD-V7400 is supposed to make an excellent transport. I procured one a while back off eBay but it ended up having technical problems and I returned it for refund.
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This thread reminds me that the Pioneer DVD-V7400 is supposed to make an excellent transport. I procured one a while back off eBay but it ended up having technical problems and I returned it for refund.
That's adorbs!
