Got My Sony Xa9000es Today!

....And I think it's amazing right out of the box! I went thru a long search for digital source (documented in my "the most neutral, natural sounding CD player" thread recenty).
Previously I had
$1200 EAD CD 1000 - coloured and unnatural
$300 Kenwood 5070 - great bang for the buck, rude and primitive but pretty honest and uncoloured if you know what I mean.
During the last few months I demoed:
$3500 used 110 V Sony SCD-1, which as I now understand was damaged - way too bright and analytical
$4000 Linn Ikemi - extremly coloured on the mids, small sounstage and redused sonic images, though nice details and good bass and silky treble
$2300 Audio Analogue Maestro - very analogue sounding indeed, but lacking the detail and muddy bass
$4500 used Mark Levinson 39 - too sharp and agressive
$4000 Lindemann 1SE - good but small soundstage and reduced sonic images as with Linn
$3000 used Wadia 20 transport with $2000 used Threshold DAC - nice but far from being worthy of their price and lacking with bass.
After all this I was in desperation. Trusting Steve's words that XA777ES is "razor flat" I tried to find it in Moscow but failed. I was also told that 9000 is not in town yet. And just today I went to Gorbushka market to get some CDs and bumped into brand new 9000! I bought it immediately for $2972 without a single listen! I guess it was crazy but WOW! This is a player which OWNS all these overpriced machines! I never heard 777 so I can't compare, but the sound is SO natural and detailed on all frequances that it's easily the best thing I ever heard. Both redbook and SACD. On Steve's Creedence SACDs you can close you eyes and believe that it's VINYL (edit - mud-)! Even Pete Mew's Machine Head and Who do we think we remsters sound fabulous. No colour to the sound at all. No digital fatique. Just truth and nothing but the truth! I'll post my more detailed review later of course, now I can only wonder:

How much time these Sonys need to break in and what change of sound can I expect?

 

According to someone I spoke to at Oade Brothers Audio in Thomasville, GA, the AX9000ES takes about 30 hours to "break in" for SACD. They noted that, in their experience, the CD portion has a much longer to "break in" period... like a week or two.

Congratulations!!! I look forward to more of your thoughts on this player once you've had a chance to give it a good spin.

 

I love my XA9000ES so far, but I got one SACD Albert King/Stevie Ray Vaughan "In Session", which is brand new, brought from tower.com, having problem, it skips badly from track 6. Disc surface has absolutely no scratch. No problem with any other discs so far.

Now I need a good two ch amp. I'm using A/V amp now, but like to get a decent pure music amp, which is around $2,000-$3,000. Can anyone recommend one?

 

I'm biased (because I used to own one) but folks around here like McIntosh's MC-202 amp. Recently discontinued, but still a winner. 200 x 2, 'bout 70lbs, and all music baby! Goes for around $1700 used.

www.mcintoshlabs.com

 

Raxel, why not start a new thread in Hardware? Many people won't see your question in this thread.

mud-

 

Having spent three years living with my 777 I can corroborate this. Like we need backup for Steve's comments...

 

It's too bad your SCD-1 was damaged,but I congratulate you on your new purchase.Hope it brings you much audio bliss.Gary.

 

Well, I obviously gave it a good spin! Bought like 20 SACDs and played both redbook and SACD intensely each day. All I can tell is that the sound is even better now! Like I read many negative reviews about Tommy SACD being bright or something but I can't hear a single weakness there! Now I'm pretty sure it's not another Astley's sonic crime (to my surprise he did a great job this time!), but these guys' systems.
To tell the truth, the SACDs sound not like "vinyl" but more as master tapes to my ears. Nothing bad about it IMHO.