Would you buy an Oppo BDP-105 now (as opposed to another player)?

By first plugging it into a preamp, or pre/pro (preamp/processor) in home theater jargon, and then plugging the preamp into the amplifier. You can also plug the Oppo into into an integrated amp or a receiver.

An integrated amp is a combination preamp/amplifier in one component. A receiver is a combination tuner/preamp/processor/amplifier in one component.

If you want to use the Oppo's digital preamplifier functionality (input selection, volume, etc.), you can plug it directly into an amplifier (i.e., a plain old amp, without source selection or volume controls), rather than into a preamp, pre/pro, integrated amp, or receiver.

 

Just for conversation...

http://www.soundandvision.com/content/cambridge-audio-azur-752bd-3d-blu-ray-player

 

Keith, is it you that likes the "target" CDs?

I've been listening recently to a lot of 1983-88 CDs using my BDP-105 via 2 channel analogue output. I'm more than pleased with its performance. I think that everything it does it does very well. And although I hate downloads with a passion I am very impressed with the way it handles a zillion and one different file types on my external hard drive, be they music, video, or photo.

 

One thing to notice is that the Cambridge weighs 11 lbs and the 105 weighs 17.3.
That's quite a difference NOT that weight alone means a performance difference but it certainly speaks to build level and perhaps a beefier transformer.

 

The Cambridge 752BD has the same digital inputs the Oppo 105 has, except for the USB DAC input.

I had both players at my home and listened to them extensively. The 752BD is a great sounding player and I almost decided for it because of the sound. But in the end I went for the Oppo because of the USB DAC, the possibility to output DSD instead of PCM when playing SACDs, the build quality and because I slightly preferred the Oppo's sound. It's really not a question of which player sounds better (both sound great imo), but which sound you prefer and how the rest of your system sounds.

 

As an aside, I went for the Marantz UD7007 in the end. SACD over HDMI sounds excellent. I listened to some of the Living Stereo discs I have. Very impressive.

 

So you're really comparing it to the 103??

 

I haven't heard the 103, so it's rather hard to compare. On the other hand, I naturally debut away from what the crowd recommends when it comes to HiFi. There's usually more than one good option.

 

Of course, thanks to the joys of predictive text, "debut" should really have said "drift"!

 

Well, speaking in vague generalities, you can't go wrong with a Marantz disc player!

 

Thanks for the link. Sound and Visions' (née Home Theater) reviews have gotten a lot better over the last few years, actually listening closely to the components rather than just comparing features.

The Cambridge Audio seems interesting, but it was pretty easy to read between the lines that the reviewer preferred the Oppo for $100 less. Still, the differences seem minor and if you are a Cambridge Audio fan and already own some of their components, the extra $100 could conceivably be worth it to you for the styling and name.

 

The video portion of the player is apparently identical. It's the audio player area that has kept me on the fence between choosing either one yet. Happy New Year Billy.

 

How's Cambridge do with firmware updates? Oppo is pretty good with doing firmware updates to fix problems and add features.

 

I think most will agree SACD and DVD audio failed though.
Sure there is still stuff out, but overall, they never caught on.

With Blu ray audio, at least millions of people have Blu ray players, and they do not need to find a special player that is able to do SACD etc.

Blu ray, just seems more logical.

The discs themselves are too expensive though. I have yet to purchase a blu ray audio title, simply based on crazy pricing.

 

My situation exactly, except I have a 103, which I just got for Christmas. It's connected to a Bellari tube headphone amp. I played the Blu-ray of Bruce Springsteen's 1978 Houston concert, which sounded fairly crappy on my Sony Blu-ray home theater, on the Oppo, and it sounds great. I couldn't be happier with it.

 

My point was that by your listening to the HDMI out, there's only slight contribution by the disc player to the eventual sound quality. If you listen that way, the Oppo 105 shouldn't even be on your radar.

 

I never had the 105 on my radar to start with.

I use HDMI for the DSD stream from many of my SACDs.

I use my phono interconnects or coax as the mood takes me for others. I'll maybe even use the AVI Lab Series too. Just depends.

 

Caught on with whom? The masses? Of course not. But is that really important? Wanna see and hear my SACD collection? Never caught on. LOL.

Name a single hi-end blu ray player and I'm not talking about the 105 either. More along the lines of Ayre or better. Additionally, let me know when Kevin Gray begins mastering for blu-ray audio.

Bottom line is that there is no need for another audiophile PHYSICAL format unless it can be shown that physical will continue for at least another 20-30 years.

 

Why does it need to be of the Ayre or better...???

 

Well, for the OP, or anyone necessarily, it doesn't "need to be". But for those of use wanting a front end for fairly hi-end speakers then it's a big deal. The point was that, as far as I know, Ayre and the other well established and far more hi-end firms (dCS, etc) are not in the blu-ray space. SACD? Yes, sir.

 

Keeping up with the Blu-ray audio/video spec(s) is a challenging game, which is why I suspect none of the smaller/boutique manufacturers dare to jump into that space.

 

As the poster above said, and I agree, but also the Blu-ray audio landscape has only very recently settled (video is ongoing, 4k upscaling, etc), SACD has been with us since 1998 as an available option. So, manufacturers have had ample time to work it out.

 

HDMI is pretty scary, I should think, for the hi-end firms. Let's say that Kevin Gray mastered some jazz albums in the blu ray format for Analogue Productions. I'd want to use a really good transport to send the raw digital over to a DAC with comparable sound quality to an Ayre. And I'd want to know that there was a "dCS Puccini" out there to handle it also so that I could upgrade many years down the line.

The future is really tough to predict in audio, so I wouldn't recommend waiting around to anyone. SACD is the physical audiophile format that is accepted today. If I had to guess, it will be the last physical format.

 

Fair enough. But will they? And why would they if physical is dying off? I'd tell the OP to get the most out of a massive SACD and redbook CD collection (today) by simply trying an Ayre at home for a few days. Sure, it's expensive. But if someone truly loves their time in the sweet spot, has really nice speakers and has the means, then it's worth checking out. I'd predict that the Ayre will deliver quite an impressive, memorable result. Those who will then break out the credit card are few and far between, but it doesn't hurt to go through the process.

 

I think you will find that records are the preferred physical audiophile format accepted today!

With over 90% of my record/CD collection unavailable on SACD and with next to no chance that it will EVER be released in this format then I have very little interest. This comes from someone who was an early adaptor (Arcam AVR 300/DV137) whom has 30 or 40 SACD’s (Everything that was available that I wanted) but without more titles I couldn’t justify SACD. In addition I found that in, in many cases, the mastering on the SACD was inferior to the CD/record and that the improvement when done well was negligible on my system.

When I upgraded my stereo system I found that the Ayre CD player improved EVERY CD I already owned by more margin than SACD over CD. This was when I realised that it’s the master that is most important and then the format.

I understand that you have a huge SACD collection and have invested heavily in the format to make sure that you can hear the difference and I think that’s great. I do not think that there are enough people in your camp (i.e. have a system to take full advantage of the format and hence make it worthwhile) to make it viable to print SACD’s at all. Yes there are many others that buy SACD’s including those who like 5.1 etc. which is keeping it on life support.