I currently have a non-Apex Rossini DAC and Rossini Clock that I use with Roon Nucleus for streaming. Out of curiosity I connected my Oppo 205 via digital coax to play CDs. Surprisingly when I compare the same track on Roon vs CD, the bottom end on the CD seems to be fuller. The Roon has better detail and sounds “better” however the CD has a more organic sound. So I’m thinking of getting back into CD listening (I have a few SACDs) but I’m not sure if upgrading to the Rossini Player is the way to go versus adding the Rossini Transport. Has anyone out there compare the CD sound quality of Rossini Player vs Rossini DAC with Rossini Transport?
My first thought is that it should sound the same however it seems like when DCS separates components ultimately the sound quality gets better. Interestingly, I know the Rossini DAC upsamples any signal to DXD or DSD but reading information about the Rossini Transport, it also states that the transport also upsamples CD to DXD or DSD. So if you go with the Rossini DAC with Rossini Transport.
BTW, I have spoke to my dealer, and they are willing to upgrade my current Rossini DAC to a Rossini Apex Player for roughly the same price as a Rossini Transport.
Thank you in advance for any information and advice.
Are you sure, Rossini transport is close to 28K (euros), DAC upgrade is around 8K (till next year).
That means you loose a lot of money if you upgrade to a Rossini player
I am not entirely sure. This is the research part of my journey. I am in the US and the Rossini transport is $26.5K. The Rossini Apex is almost $37K. My dealer said the Apex uppgrade is $9K. I have been mulling just doing the Apex upgrade and I will probably do that, but I wanted to see if adding a DCS disc player worth the improvement in sound quality over an external transport and/or my current Tidal streaming service. I haven’t found any information that compares the rossini transport vs the rossini player so I am turned to this forum to see if anyone has heard or tried the comparison themselves.
I would rather go for an external CD transport- just think about if the player /transport
unit in the Rossini player fails, so you have to send back the entire unit. Of course, with that approach it’s not possible to play SACDs…
I have listened to the Rossini Player (non Apex) and the Rossini Transport (connected to the Rossini Player) and was amazed by the difference in SQ when playing the same CD (in favor of the transport)
Probably the Vivaldi transport will be a clear step up from the Rossini transport (Esoteric drive for the Vivaldi, the Rossini transport has a more modest Denon/Marantz drive)
But as always, best to visit a dealer that has the devices for demo (not always easy I know) and listen yourself.
PS. I have an oppo 103D (with an Audiopraise digital output board installed DSD(dop output), although it works quite well the CD layer (hybrid SACD) sounds better on my Rossini player then playing the SACD on the Oppo but the SACD rip (done with the Oppo) played from an SSD (USB) sounds best in my system.
This year, back in June I got a Rossini Apex Dac and Rossini Transport.
Last 6 months or so I hardly had 20-25 hrs of listening to streaming music (collectively using Roon, Mosaic or through NDX-2 over spdif) to Rossini Apex Dac compared to close to 300 hrs of listening through the Rossini Transport to the Dac over double AES2. Old CDs work just great using DSD upsampler and for newer ones I use DXD (both up sampled at transport reducing load on the Dac).
This combo sounds so great that I even started listening less to my favorite P10 with Apheta 3 cartridge.
Now, whether u will also experience similar sound quality with Rossini Player apex is a bit of subjective question to me . Most probably the ROI is big factor too as with Rossini Transport u pay $23k USD more.
I had a home demo of Rossini player 2 years back. It was pretty great too. I did not get into a/b comparison at my dealers when I was ready to purchase this year. Mostly because as I already had a separate CD/SACD transport ( ps audio) I kind of had a good idea of what kind of sound quality difference I can expect with separates. In my mind the Rossini separates exceeded that expectation of mine by many times.
So as they say, u better get demo of both options (preferably home demo) and urself judge the ROI of spending that extra 23 grand. Btw with the separates u get to listen to sacds too (again superb, out of the world, reproduction). Also u get better coverage on overall listening uptime in case of failure.