AVI Laboratory Series CD Player - the latest purchase!

It's been a good month for me - I posted before about finding an Arcam Alpha 6 CD player a chap near me was selling which turned out to be a good option. Late last week I was on Gumtree again (as I often am!) and someone up in Aberdeen was selling - for a killer price - AVI's highly rated Laboratory Series CD player.

This came out ten years ago, and was partnered with the matching amplifier (250wpc and equally well rated). The units were £1500 each on release so beyond my means at the time. Fortunately, they're not the kind of gear you trash at that price and the one I picked up on Saturday was in fine condition. Showroom practically.

When this came out in 2003, the reviews positively glowed for it and the partnering Lab Series amp. Great sound, great build. In practice, it's a very fine machine. For the price I paid (£300), it's a steal, but it's not five times the player that the Arcam Alpha 6 is that I bought for £60 a few weeks before. That said, I've been playing a stack of CDs since I bought the Lab Series player which speaks volumes I think.

Build is excellent; it's more of a midi-sized unit. Wider than Cyrus, but about a third less than standard hifi separates, I'd say at a rough guess. The CD tray fair shoots out, but is nothing special, some would be disappointed with this for the price paid, but the truth of it is it works a treat, is a common design and is easily replaceable in the event of a problem. The unit I bought is in near perfect shape, and I've not had any issues so far. There are a few dealers out there who can help out so I won't be stuck in the event of a problem.

The sound quality is excellent - very clean sounding, letting the heart of the music shine through. Nothing's fazed it yet; just listening to Peer Gynt, but we've gone from Elvis Costello, the excellent Sarah Cracknell Lipslide album, and a whole pile of others. UFO's mighty 1978 "Obsession" album currently spinning away. All in all, it's terrific.

But, would I have spent £1500 on it...? No. Obviously, I didn't at the time, so the question then becomes, was it worth £1500! That's a different question and I think there are more reasons than just audio quality when buying luxury hi-fi goods. Or expensive goods in general really.

All in all, the Lab Series player is a fabulous machine, but the gap as ever is small with good digital products. The Marantz, Denon, and Arcam players I have all show this to be true (to my ears at least!). The gap is so narrow and this has been borne out across a wide range of systems. Still, that wasn't the point of buying the thing! If you get the chance and want a top machine at what will probably be a good price, you know what to do!

 

Forgot, here's some shots of the Lab Series units:-






...and the amp...

 

I have the AVI Lab Series amp and for £250-300 which I've seen the AVI cd player sell for I was thinking I might give it a try but think I'll go for the Teac PD-H600 instead, it's a similar smaller sized component and matches the look of the AVI amp pretty well, can be had for £250-300 and I figure with more recent DACs it might have better sound.

It's amazing how much cd players drop in value.

 

I think you'd find the AVI to be a better unit to hold on to it's value than the Teac however. AVI used some good DACs at the time and build is as good as you'll get. If it's the same money, I'd be all over the AVI.

 

I had the Lab series monoblocs (620 wpc)
Build q excelent
SQ brill
Only downside low level Torroid buzz.

 

One of my local shops used to carry AVI. Lovely stuff, but a little spendy for me. Endorsed by none other than David Gilmour according to their brochure as I recall.