Older CD players?

[lorne]

QUESTION: Does anyone have any experience with 1986/87 Sony CDP-222ES?

I read a review on the export CDX- 222ES "Elite". Not very inspiring, but it may be a different player but with the same layout. The "CDP" had some very nice caps and a different DAC chipset.

 

[restorer-john]

I own an ultra rare CD12/DA12LE Marantz combo, 500 only on the planet and it is truly amazing. Uses KI's ultimate twin TDA1541 S1 layout- three transformers in the DAC alone. The transport is essentially a CD-94.

The PD91/93 and the big Sonys (CDPX7esd/X77esd) are in the same league, but the big Marantz kills them in musicality.

I love my X7esd, it's my reference, but the Philips (Marantz) CD12/DA12, is the ultimate machine to my ears,so I gave it to my Dad, he loves it.

A few examples of excellent old CDP's... TOTL Pioneer PD-91/93,NEC CD-903,or Micromega Solo H all from the very late 80's/early 90's... they were built to last back then (you can tell just by their weight/build quality alone),therefore they have excellent heavily engineered transports,power supplies/transformers (gives that certain heavy "oomph" feeling to the music which is all but sadly lacking nowadays). Also,if you hook 'em up to something like a Marantz CDA-94 DAC using quality interconnects and/or optical cable you'll be laughing even more!

BTW,the twin TDA-1541 DA converters in the Marantz CDA-94 aren't manufactured anymore because of their relatively high production costs in today's low quality standard CD/DVD era. These were among the best D/A converters ever manufactured. It's true what they sometimes say... "you never miss a good thing till it's gone"!

 

[restorer-john]

I havetwo CDP-338esd and three CDP-X7esd .

QUESTION: Does anyone have any experience with 1986/87 Sony CDP-222ES?

I read a review on the export CDX- 222ES "Elite". Not very inspiring, but it may be a different player but with the same layout. The "CDP" had some very nice caps and a different DAC chipset.