What's a decent 150 disk or more cd changer

bevo

I want to buy a 150 or more disk cd changer. I really don't want to spend much money. Anyone know of any decent ones to buy.

I actually have a 200 disk changer that's 12 years old, but I couldn't find the power cord, or remote for it. It only has rca outs, and I don't know if I should look for something with an optical out or not. That is the last cd player that I ever bought, and I don't know how it would sound. The power cord and remote would run me about 40-50$ to replace them. So I think buying a new one would be a better option.

Has technology advanced enough in cd players to warrent buying a newer one, or would my old one with rca outs work fine?

Any advice would be great.

Gadabout

The only manufactuer that I know of that is still making the Juke Box CD players is Sony

I have seen some used ones from Kenwood and JVC. I would suspect that not much has changed with the Juke Boxes over the years. The newer ones might have better internal DAC's, but I have never done a comparison with my existing player and a juke box. I have a friend that does have the Sony 300 CD juke box, he seems to like it. It is more about convienance than quality of sound for him. It fills the bill for him and his family.

The newer ones do offer SACD, MP3 and other formats that you older one doesn't. Don't know if that's important to you. How is the old one running? No skipping? Still aceessing the diaks correctly? I would wonder after 12 years if it wouldn't be time for a tune -up and cleaning. My guess is you might not be able to hear much of a difference between you old one and a new one, but it might have more convienace features you would prefer.

Wish I could be more help,
Scott

ben62670

I have a 200 disk Sony CDP, and a 400 disk Sony DVD/SACD/CDP. They are just fine with an outboard DAC. The analog section is lacking for most users. I would look for something with digital outs.
Ben

BlueFox

Do yourself a favor and get a digital music server. It will store thousands of CDs with instant access, random shuffle, etc. The quality of sound will be dependant on two factors; the method used to store the music on the harddrive, and the exteranl DAC.

bevo

BlueFox wrote: »

Do yourself a favor and get a digital music server. It will store thousands of CDs with instant access, random shuffle, etc. The quality of sound will be dependant on two factors; the method used to store the music on the harddrive, and the exteranl DAC.

What is the best format to use when putting cd's on a hardrive. I can put them on my ps3 and use it. It uses ATRAC 352 kbps. Is that a pretty high quality transfer for cd's, or can I get a better format and quality using a computer.

BlueFox

bevo wrote: »

What is the best format to use when putting cd's on a hardrive. I can put them on my ps3 and use it. It uses ATRAC 352 kbps. Is that a pretty high quality transfer for cd's, or can I get a better format and quality using a computer.

The best format is either uncompressed, or a form of lossless encoding. Lossless means it is compressed on the drive, but when uncompressed it is bit for bit identical to the CD data. Any form of compression, as you suggested above, will degrade the sound quality.

Of course, another factor in this equation is the DAC being used. A music server using uncompressed, or lossless, files, coupled with a good DAC, will give the best CD players a run for the money. And, there is no way a CD player can come close to the power, versatility, and convenience of a music server.

The drawback to a music server is you cannot put SACD files on it, but that is a minor negative.

rallyshark

I also have the sony 400 disc changer, and it has worked well for me. It also has optical, multichannel, and coax outputs, which gives you plenty of options. They can be had for just over $300 bucks new, and alot less used if you do some searching. Happy shopping!

ahorvitz

I have a Pioneer Elite DV-F07. It's a 300+1 DVD player - overkill, particularly since I use my PS3 as my video source these days. But I've found it to be a solid CD player. It's got multi, coax, and optical outs. Much like the Sonys, it can be piggybacked with another unit. Pioneer isn't making them anymore, but I've seen them on eBay.

bevo

BlueFox wrote: »

The best format is either uncompressed, or a form of lossless encoding. Lossless means it is compressed on the drive, but when uncompressed it is bit for bit identical to the CD data. Any form of compression, as you suggested above, will degrade the sound quality.

Of course, another factor in this equation is the DAC being used. A music server using uncompressed, or lossless, files, coupled with a good DAC, will give the best CD players a run for the money. And, there is no way a CD player can come close to the power, versatility, and convenience of a music server.

The drawback to a music server is you cannot put SACD files on it, but that is a minor negative.

What formats will not compress the file. I use the best one my ps3 has, and it sounds a little muddy when I listen to them on it, and I've never really been one to uze a computer for anything but mp3's with my ipod. I would like to use a media server, but everything just doesn't seem to sound as good, as actually using the cd's. If I knew how to actually get the best sound out of a media server, that would definetly be the way I would go.

BlueFox

These two links provide a good overview of uncompressed and lossless compression for audio files. A Google search will provide 1000s more.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_compression_(data)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_file_format

Are you using an external DAC with your PS3, or just the PS3 for playback? As mentioned, there are two components to having CD quality audio with a music server. The audio files must be bit for bit identical to the CD file, and the DAC must be of high quality. Scrimping on either will yield muddy, or worse, sound.

ViperZ

Uncompressed MP3 format is out. Read up on it...