Thanks for the information George. Much easier than going into the menu on Oppo players to change the SACD priority from SACD to CD.
And it starts back at track 1 regardless of where you are on the disc. I've been A/B'ing for a while now. I always start with the CD layer, which sounds fantastic. I think, "how can it be better?", then switch to the SACD layer. As discussed, it takes a stop/start to switch layers so there's a little delay involved. Anyway, there is a clear difference. The SACD layer reveals greater clarity, depth, and a more open sound-stage. It's most noticeable in vocals, which come across as having greater timbre. Not a 'night & day' difference, to be sure, but it is a revelation. I listened to a few of Steve's Nat "King" Cole remasters, Dire Straits' Love Over Gold, and Pretenders II. This unit is in my dedicated 2-channel system, so I won 't be able to comment on any 5.1 mixes.
I just received a Denon DCD-1600NE. I haven’t really had time to listen to it, but one thing I noticed right away is that while playing the SACD layer of hybrid discs it makes a whirring sound similar to a computer fan. If the room is quiet and the speakers are off I can just make out the sound from my listening spot, which is 10 or 12 feet away. By contrast with the same discs my Marantz SA8004 makes a similar but quieter sound that I can’t hear from more than 2 or 3 feet away. Both players are very quiet when playing the CD layers of those discs, presumably because CDs spin slower, and I can only hear them if I put my ear almost right next to the drawer. My question is whether my copy of the DCD-1600NE is unusually noisy when playing SACDs, or if they are all about the same. Can anyone who owns one comment on that? Thanks. I’m trying to decide if it’s worth asking for a replacement, or if a new one would probably be about the same.
I just checked a CD, a single layer SACD and a hybrid SACD on my DCD-1600NE and on each I get a slight whirring sound from a foot away, but beyond that I hear no noise. Occasionally, I have heard it make a louder noise, perhaps when error correcting or something, but only loud enough to hear from maybe a few feet away, never loud enough to hear across the room. I had that issue (loud enough internal noise to hear across the room) with a Yamaha CD player once (the CD-S700) and returned it immediately.
I also own the Denon DCD-1600NE and it is the noisiest SACD player I have owned. I bought it from Accessories For Less at a discount from full price. I suspect it was a customer return for being so noisy. Mostly on Sacd, regular CDs spin fairly quietly.
The sound on mine is nearly imperceptible. If I lean very close in I can hear the slightest whir. Must have the caterpillar drive from Red October.
Thanks everyone for responding. I guess I’ll use it for a while to see whether or not I like it, and based on that decide whether to ask for a replacement or a refund.
My Denon DCD-1600NE replacement arrived yesterday! On the back of the unit is s sticker that says it was manufactured in October of this year. Plugged it into my system at 5pm and started a SACD on repeat. Won't be able to do any listening until later today.
I noticed something interesting today, listening to this Columbia House CD Anita Baker - Rapture I heard the noise you describe above, between tracks. I did some testing and noticed that the noise is louder when I switch to the later tracks. I happen to have a non-Club copy of this CD and tried it out and it makes almost no noise while playing/spinning. Both discs were pressed by SRC and both have very few marks, in fact, the one with more marks is the non-Club CD. I then grabbed another Columbia House CD, a Led Zeppelin one and sure enough, it made the same whirring sound when playing. I also grabbed a BMG CD, a Depeche Mode, and it did not make the sound. Finally, I grabbed a CRC Genesis DADC CD and that also did not make the sound. I also checked a few of my Hybrid SACDs and they are quiet while playing the SACD layer, even quieter than when playing redbook CDs. All of the above tests were done with the speakers disabled in a fairly quiet room.
I’m sure the amount of noise and the pitch of the noise depends on how fast the disc is spinning, which is determined by where the laser is located on the disc (as the laser moves outward while playing the disc the speed gradually drops). Also, some discs may be slightly unbalanced, which could cause vibration and noise at certain speeds where resonance occurs. And I suppose discs might vary in weight, or might not be perfectly flat. Anyway, I wound up getting a refund because I was afraid a replacement unit would make the same amount of noise. Also, I was disappointed to find that the player adds brief gaps between adjacent tracks in program mode. I contacted Denon and they said “In program mode, based on the information available, it's normal for there to be gaps between songs”. That’s a problem when there’s no pause in the recording between tracks, which is the case with a lot of my discs.
I really liked Pioneer's Stable Platter Mechanism on CD players in the 1990's. The tray had a platter,verbatim,it was very slightly concave so CD sit fully flat on it. CD had to be upside down and the laser pick up was on top of the reading unit. This worked like a charm, got a very stable reading of CD's and it was also very quiet.It guess this may have help to reduce jitter. It's a pitty that this kind of reading drive didn't make it to other brands and passed the 1990's or the early 2000's. It would have been great to have SACD players with this kind of drive. It looked like this:
Definitely not gonna cut it for me, and insulting for a product well north of a grand... If I bite, which is likely, extended warranty with added cost will be a must. George, thanks for the reply....
Does anybody have any suggestions where a Denon DCD-1600NE can be purchased along with an extended warranty of 5 years or so? Also any vouching for the seller from past experience is much welcome......Thanks
Sorry, can't help with that. I can say that my replacement has been going for 6 weeks of heavy daily usage (I'd guess 500 hours or so) and haven't had a single problem.