I need to buy a dvd player for about £40 second hand.
Which one will have the best SQ when playing CDs into my Naim system (either digital audio out into nDAC or analog audio out into my 52)?
Any ideas of older DVD/CD players that had good quality CD audio output?
I have a Yamaha s700 which was (I think) the first model they made. I bought it in 1998 (or thereabouts) for £600. It makes a very good transport, totally silent, but I wouldn’t use its internal dac; it has both optical and coax digital out. This is years before hdmi was invented.
There’s one on eBay but for a player that’s 25 years ago I’m not sure of the true market value.
Ken Micallef of Stereophile uses a LG BD550 BD player (as transport). See his review of the Nad C328. I’ve got one too and it’s great with a decent DAC. £40’ish on a well-known auction site.
I have a Cambridge Audio 55 50 Series dvd player that I used before i acquired an Oppo player. Excellent sound quality into naim gear and I’ve kept it as it’s a great source when the main system is out of action ( eg decorating) I see there is one on E bay now for £30.
Thanks chaps, very useful advice and ideas.
One additional question: I haven’t used a DVD player for many years.
My wife and I are planning to watch our old DVDs of the wire
Silly question, but when you’re streaming things, the system remembers where you got to carry on the next day
On a DVD, do you have to fiddle around with fast forward to find the place where you last watched it?
I’m aware of this probably varies depending on the specific machine, but is this basically easy or is it a Hassle?
You’re right, it depends on the age/specific machine. Apparently newer models have the facility to memorise where a disc is stopped, even if a disc is removed.
Our Panasonic Blu-ray remembers, but I don’t know if it’s just for the last disc, or if it stores a few in memory.
Just bear in mind that the main disadvantage of using a DVD player to play CDs is that their handling and navigation of the discs is nowhere near as slick as it is with a proper CD player. As a transport for CD replay, I much prefer using a proper CD player or transport over a DVD player.
Massive vote for option 1 here
That feature is very handy when listening to audio books .
Usually the latter. Based on my experience, it seems to be disc-dependent (some discs are authored to do so but some will force you to sit through countless copyright notices and studio logos every single time), though Blu-rays tend to be better. That said, even some very basic early DVDs do it - it’s a total dice-roll. Very annoying that an industry standard didn’t establish itself.
Mark (silver disc addict - CD/DVD/BR/4K!)
I have a fair few HD DVDs and a player too 
Any CD-Vs?!
Afraid not nor any Laserdisc stuff.
The HD DVD player and HD DVDs were purchased fairly cheap when the format died and they seemed a bargain at the time. Later got an Xbox device which could be used to rip the HD DVDs, though I think many failed due to rapid onset disc rot.
Hmm yes HD-DVDs in their format war were giving some phenomenal price to performance ratios.
The third gen units, for a small outlay, would deliver double or better quality, by equivalent ‘tier’ to other options.
As someone who has bought a few flagship laserdisc players (to use as CD transports) I had to bite my tongue when this thread first presented itself.
Lots of suggestions, but really- simply at mercy of ‘local market’.
My local trading post had a 10k$ disc spinner sell for 300$
II have bought 10k$ disc spinners for ‘similar’ price points. (18x blackgate cap upgraded DENON DCD-S10 with a superclock II mod)
Heck my Teac P700 cost $80 (‘sans remote’) with warranty.
Given the thread stipulating DVD player; my first thought was the venerable Pioneer DV-655. (used the same SuperCD handling as the Sony ‘proper’ SACD players, vs most market players that were SACD ‘compatible’; DV-655 also did DVD Audio and I bought one new for $133 (with five bonus DVDs/ an HDVD sampler and a movie mag in the box) from a big retailer on clearance. Nearly nineteen years ago.
I have a few 'transport’s in the house… some given to me after doing IT work for clients etc… a Philips recorder actually had an incredible Philips mechanism/drive inside. If it wasn’t for the mild fan noise of the unit in operation, I’d recommend (it certainly yields better audio than I expected and is one of the ‘better’ finds).
I’d just be flexible on price point and jump on whatever the biggest saving is you can find locally.
Be ready to jump on it.
And enjoy your, ideally, heavyweight, centre drive mounted, multiformat capable disc spinner. (with or WITHOUT a remote).
I am a big fan of weight cause it usually indicates effort given to power supply/regulation.
Thank you for your ideas.
In the end we decided to stream the series.
I suspect you may be referring to the Philips DVDR1000, which I purchased way back in 2001. The competence of CD replay was noted at the time, which was half my motive.
Sadly, the software went wonky and it’s stuck in the loft (with its remote), awaiting a day when it becomes a retro classic, rather than a brick.
Can you recommend a Blu-ray player that does save the place you last played to on a disc?
No - as I said in my earlier post, it seems to be disc-dependent.
Every BD player I’ve got will remember where disc A was up to because disc A was authored to do so, and won’t remember where disc B was up to because disc B wasn’t authored that way. It’s a bit irritating.
Mark