"Trevor Wilson" wrote
in message
"Rob" wrote in message
...
Trevor Wilson wrote:
"Martin "Schöön"" wrote in
message ...
Gentlemen,

I replaced the driving belt of my trusted old Thorens
TD166 this week and today I find the CD-player has
become so upset by this it refuses to play or even
acknowledge the existence of the CDs I feed it.

The CD player is a Cambridge Audio thing (everything
important inside is labeled Sony) about five years
old (the Thorens is 25 years old).

So, even though the Thorens 166 works just fine and
I have a number of LPs to play I am in the market
for a CD-player.

I don't care much for fancy brand names and exotic
design but I want good sound reproduction. (and
reliability).

Any recommendations?
Second hand? (New models are not always better)
DVD-players?

**Forget second hand, unless you are prepared to throw
a new laser in a decent exotic machine. IMO, the best
value around today is the Harman Kardon HD970.
Brilliant machine for not too much cash. It'll even
play MP3s. Trevor Wilson

It's well over 200UKP. Why does it sound better than a
Sony £30 DVD player?

**Send me the schematic of your 30 Squid Sony and I'll
tell you. The HK has a number of significant technical
details which, IMO, make it sound better than all the
cheap players (and most of the expensive ones) I've ever
heard.

I thought that all named CDPs sound identical nowadays?!

**I suggest you do some listening. You may well be in for
a shock.

If you listen with a salesman in attendance, or after reading the usual
ignorant hype in one of the high end ragazines, or if you speak with a
friend who has spent stupid money on a high end optical disc player, then
you may well hear better sound from the more expensive player. That's the
major problem with sighted evaluations - you never know why you perceive
what you may think you perceive.

Doing a decent job of comparing optical disc players is a often lot of
work - the big problem is getting and keeping the discs in synch. I've done
it, and the results were amazingly small audible differences, some of which
were found to be imaginary when the statistical analysis was complete.