Recently picked up a superb condition example for £50. This player was supposed to support my CD transport needs for the rare occasions where I play CDs, and my DVD player (now only playing movies) was quite frankly appalling compared to my PC & HagUSB setup into my DAC.
Usually I've enjoyed using old Philips swingarm based machines as transports including Rotel 965BX and Marantz CD65DX (with hall motor), but the stable platter transports picked my fancy as they seem to have a cult following like the swingarms do.
The Pioneer PD-S505 was chosen for multiple reasons including:
* A higher grade transport mech than a lot of stable platter players
* Tom Evans used it for his Precision version
* Trichord used it as the basis for their Genesis CD player / transport
* Dedicated coaxial SPDIF output board (more on this later)
I was disappointed as one of my reference CDs, Lamb's "What Sound", quickly showed my computer-based transport a clean pair of heels. The Pioneer PD-S505 instantly added more "weight" & "authority" and allowed my Amphion Argon2s to throw an even bigger soundstage with more delineation between performers & instruments. I guess I wanted the HagUSB combo to sound better as this is what I listen to a lot of music through.
Listening to Joni Mitchell's "Blue" on CD the vocals are much more organic and lack a slight hardness in the extreme treble that I've previously had with other transports. This CD will tear apart bright and/or sibilant systems!
Looks like I'll be using more CDs for a while!
Some more findings etc. to add as to why it does sound so good, but I think the dedicated SPDIF board will be a big factor: