Multi-disc cd player

Sorry to ask another stupid question, but who makes a quality ($3000 to $6000) CD player that hold more than one cd? I'm old, fat, and lazy.

 

Not to be snarky, but that's what computer audio is for. My hard drive has nearly a thousand cds loaded.

 

Sony made some decent 300/400 cd changers that can still be found in nice shape and for tons less than than 3000 bones. I saw an ES model (ES is Sony's higher end stuff) 300 cd changer somewhere once and almost grabbed it, but honestly the regular one I found in a thrift store works and sounds just fine. They have digital out so you can jack that thru your favorite high end DAC, spend your money on that and the DAC can always adapt to some other digital device (computer, etc.) in the future.

 

I am using a Nakamichi CDPlayer2
From the 90's.
Apart from being the best sounding player i have heard uses a 6 disc
Changer which loads the drawer
Normally and is not imposing any
Sonic penalties.

 

I had two. Complete pieces of junk. To put it kindly. First one died so I got another. Gave it away. The sound was horrible.

 

First off let me say, I'm not really an audiophile. I am the destitute music junkie. Most audiophiles would probably consider this piece of equipment junk, but hey...it works.

I have a Pioneer from the '90s that holds 100 CDs. I've been using it for darn near 20 yrs and it hasn't missed a beat. A little clunky when on random, but never screws up. I have it filled with various artist discs that I have purchased and burned myself so it's like having a giant jukebox.

Looks a bit Easy Bake Ovenish, or like it could pop popcorn, but hey it works fine.

 

Never liked mult-disc players. They always seemed to fail and only certain slots would read or whatever. Single disc or bust. If you need to cue up a ton of music for non-stop listening, time for DAC + SSD + Foobar.

 

The one I have seems pretty stout, but to be honest I haven't plugged it in for a few years now. My experience with Sony in general mirrors your thoughts regarding the units you owned, I won't buy anything made by that company as 8 times out of 10 something will fail with their equipment, even their better stuff. The 300 disc player I have by them has so far been a decent score for $25 as it keeps working and doesn't sound bad (not sure what I was running it through when I last used it, but at the time I thought it was fairly warm sounding though a tad dull) - just decent, running the Toslink through a DAC would hopefully sidestep whatever it sounds like on it's own I would think.
I would heartily recommend getting tech savvy enough to go the hard drive route, you asked about multi disc players and the one I mentioned is my only experience other than an early nineties Sony ES 5 disc that recently lost control of it's reader functions...but it sounded pretty sweet prior to that.
Pioneer is a good company, I suppose it is possible that the Pioneer Elite model multi disc could hit the sweet spot, other than that all I got is what is already here:

 

Onkyo Integra (their higher end products) make the CDC 3.4. It is a 6 CD changer for around $350.

 

I wasn't aware of the used market for stereo components until recently here on this forum.
I have been wanting to get another CD player as a back up if mine blew and if players were no longer made in the future.
So I saw this on Amazon and ordered it, Sony CDP-CE500 5-Disc CD Changer (Black), comes with the remote while most other used ones do not.
Condition listed as "Used - Very Good" for $99.95 delivered. They were in the 500 to 600 dollar range originally weren't they?

 

I have a CE500 that I use in my garage system. It's noisy and clunky but it is holding up. I believe they were under $150 originally, not $500 or $600.

 

My CE-375 was $150.00 but from the searches I come up with for the CE-500 $400.00 is the lowest I saw, I saw one refurbished for $695.00.

btw is Sony out of the CD player business? I went to their website and all I see are portable boom box type players.

 

Onkyo USA Corporation

I have the previous model, still working after 15 years.

 

I've never had an issue with a CD changer as long as it was a 5-disc carousel type (I've had two Sony players, and have a Philips). It is fairly simple to use, easy to load, and could hold an entire box set. A number of them had a single-disc feature that would allow you quickly load and play a single disc just like with a single CD player.

However, I wanted nothing to do with the cartridge-type change (insert six CDs into the cartridge, then insert the cartridge into the player) because I considered it too complex to be reliable. Plus, it seemed like a lot of work to play a single disc (about as much work to load a single disc as multiple discs). I had one in my car for a short time, but it was such a pain to use that I replaced it with a CD/MP3 player.

 

The reason that the prices are high for the Sony players is that you can't get them anymore. The seller can charge what he likes. Maybe some fool will come along and pay that price.

It seems that quite a few manufacturers are getting out of the cd/dvd player market. You might look at Yamaha.

 

Those are cheap and still available.

 

I cancelled that Sony, you guys talked me out of it.
If this one was a 5 disc player I would get it now, Onkyo C-7000R
Onkyo USA Corporation
I may pull the trigger but there is no rush,

 

For $149 you could try the 6 CD Onkyo changer posted above. For that amount, it works very good and sounds ok. Can be improved with an external DAC. The unit is not very quiet while changing the discs, but that only takes around 5 seconds between loading.

 

I have a Sony CE-375 5 disc player but that Onkyo DX-C390 would be an good one to get for just keeping it boxed away until the Sony blows because by then my concern is being able to buy a CD player at all.
But I am being influenced by this forum and my interest keeps growing, so like I said I may get that Onkyo C-7000R but no rush I'm still "shopping".
As a matter of fact if I would like to do a major upgrade of my entire system, I would do it but I get frustrated with all that's out there and all the different opinions I read here. Also no where around here to listen at a store/showroom.

 

As I stated earlier, Onkyo Integra makes the CDC 3.4, a six cd changer, for around $350.

 

That one is not on Onkyo's website but I found it here for $300.00 and free shipping. Looks good.
Integra CDC-3.4 6-disc CD Carousel

 

Not exactly the same but related: When I saw how the portable CD player market was going (basically the number of available players and their quality seemed to be going down), I decided to buy a number of good portable CD/MP3 players (I already had a Sony and a Philips and decided to buy a few more Philips) and I'm glad I did. Soon after, the number of players dwindled to a small number and the remaining players were not ones I would buy. Now when I visit stores, it seems like often the number of models of portable CD available is just one (I have not checked out Amazon but I suppose I should some time).

Despite having a number of digital audio players, I still want the option to play my actual CDs or burned CDs on the go. Sometimes, like when I'm traveling, it is more practical to have a player that I can power with a set of AA batteries I can get anywhere and can play for more than 40 hours on a set of batteries.

 

Exactly my thinking, the world can go Cloud but I have around 550 CDs (more to come no doubt) and I like them and want to keep playing them. So I have been thinking about back up players for a while.

 

You won’t find it on the Onkyo website but under the separate Onkyo Integra website. You might ask Audio Advice if they are a qualified dealer as well. If not you will not be sending it back if problems occur.

 

As has been previously suggested to buy a thrift shop large capacity CD change, or one that is for sale on eBay.

You can use the digital out to the input of the DAC of your choice.

But, as @timind has pointed out, why not just rip them to a hard drive and be done with it. These days, a CD changer is like showing slides with a Kodak, Carousel slide projector. Given the two options, I would opt for the slide projector.

I was also considering going the 300-disk CD changer. But I went in a different direction.

I would recommend it to anyone who is old, fat and lazy, such as myself.

There is a self contained unit called a Brennan B2, I bought one of these. They are available in different memory size capacities. In addition, you can plug in any standard memory stick.

You don't need to have a CD or computer or any software. You just slide a CD into the unit, it rips it to FLAC. Well, it actually rips it to a WAV file, for quick ripping and then it goes through and converts them to either FLAC or compressed MP3 files, later, in the background when the unit is not ripping files.

It also works as a regular CD player.

You can connect the unit wirelessly to the Internet so it can get the album artwork and metadata information. But the unit also has a huge internal database of artwork and metadata and may not require an Internet connection to obtain this data. It also has a Bluetooth dongle and can act as a stand alone CD player.

It is an all in one, self contained solution.



It is also available through Amazon.