CD players
When Compact Disc launched, we were told that it would provide “perfect sound forever”. We’re fairly sure that by “forever” they weren’t predicting that CD would become the last physical music format in history — but that’s almost certainly the case, along with the delightful shock survival of vinyl. Meanwhile the longevity of the discs themselves are currently delivering a bonanza of bargain secondhand CDs as people ditch their collections — we routinely return from a charity shop with 10 classic CDs for $8 the lot. (It’s worth remembering the same price levels were once applied to secondhand vinyl, but no longer. So get ’em while you can.)
You could, of course, rip all your CDs and then play them from computer or to a streamer. But your most reliable and potentially cost-effective replay method may be the traditional way — a CD player as part of your hi-fi system. Many of us are guilty of neglecting this manstay of source components; indeed our winner here was on the market for two years before we came to discover its wonders, despite it winning a prestigious Diapason D-Or award in 2013. So welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the excellent NAD C 546 BEE CD player.
We wonder how many of our readers spent their student days or youth with a classic NAD system — CD, amp and speakers. These readers will be pleased to know that NAD has never rested on its laurels, though some elements have remained a constant. Unlike Coca-Cola, NAD’s winning formula is not a secret. The company specialises in minimalist exterior designs, small-sized chassis, doesn’t offer colour options and keeps its models in its range for extended periods.
As with its innovative digital amplification in our Amplifier awards on p72, the company does head into the high-end, but it mostly concentrates on the valuefor-money sector. This C 546 BEE CD player has an RRP of $849, for which you get a well-built, well-designed player that sounds great at the price and receives our highest recommendation. Very NAD, there’s little in the way of potentially superfluous extras, though there’s a front-mounted USB slot into which you can insert external memory (sticks or drives) to replay through the NAD’s DAC at bit-rates up to 384kbps. Those internal electronics include a Wolfson WM8740 digitalto-analogue converter and high quality OPA 2134 op-amps; one bonus of this DAC chip is its selectable filter, which NAD implements through the excellent provided remote control, allowing switching between ‘Normal’ and ‘Slow’. These correspond to a sharp roll-off filter and a slow roll-off filter (3dB down at 23.6kHz, compared with 21.8kHz with the steep filter). This was very easy to use, as was the whole player, the multifunction rotary knob in particular.
The sound quality was also a delight. The NAD excelled with its abilities to portray everything from grungy electric guitar to delicate acoustic playing, from shimmering cymbals and light piano touches to complex jazz ensembles with dynamic drum parts — the NAD released the detail and dynamics of it all. Given this analogue output quality, you may never need the digital outputs, though unusually at this price point, the coaxial output is buffered and isolated by a 75-ohm transformer, aiming to deliver a low-jitter output for an external DAC.
Don’t neglect your CDs — a few hours relaxing to the NAD C 546 BEE will remind you what you’re missing. More info:
www.qualifi.com.au