https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4753/...060ea375_b.jpg
Ding dong the CD’s dead, or so goes the incessant chant of the magazine pundits who need to fill their pages with endless dribble about one prediction after another. Those magazine pages need to be filled with something. The fact is CD sales have been declining for years as high-res downloads and CD quality streaming entered the audio scene, but by no means are CD sales dead, nor are there any shortages of CD players and CD transports being introduced by respected audio manufacturers. I guess they must have missed the memo that CD’s died. One such respected audio manufacture, Simaudio in Quebec, Canada, isn’t influenced by the CD naysayers. They continue to offer the MOON Neo 260D Transport/DAC for those compact disc connoisseurs who reject the media’s herd mentality, and continue to embrace the impressive audio performance delivered by compact discs.
Simaudio’s MOON Neo 260D can be purchased in two forms, as a transport only ($2000) and as a transport/DAC ($3000) with the optional factory installed 32Bit DAC. Since my choice is to use an external DAC, I purchased the MOON Neo 260D transport only version. It is a robust CD transport with an oversized power supply that provides 13 stages of voltage regulation, five of which are dedicated to the transport. For an owner who may wish to add the DAC at a later date the MOON Neo 260D can be factory retrofitted with the DAC. The proprietary CD transport hardware and software are developed in-house. The CD drive is mounted on Simaudio’s M-Quattro gel-based 4-point floating suspension for vibration damping. This is said to allow ambient and spatial cues in recordings to come to life like never before. The 260D provides two SPDIF digital outputs, coaxial and AES/EBU balanced. With over 30 years of experience manufacturing audio components, Simaudio’s know-how is clearly represented in the MOON Neo 260D.
It is suggested in the 260D owner’s manual that performance will improve through 400 hours of break-in required for the numerous high quality electronic parts. I have played one CD after another continuously since unpacking the 260D transport, and when not listening to the transport I engaged the Repeat feature that allows uninterrupted playback until manually stopped. The MOON Neo 260D now has 414 hours of break-in completed. In addition, I changed the digital cable from a Wireworld Silver Starlight coaxial interconnect to a Wireworld Gold AES/EBU digital interconnect at 129 hours of break-in, so the AES/EBU cable now has 285 hours of break-in on it as well. From day one the Neo 260D has been powered with a two meter Wireworld Silver Electra power cable.
The MOON Neo 260D transport is feeding a digital stream to a Schiit Audio Yggdrasil DAC. The Yggdrasil has 1471 hours logged on it. From the very first CD I played on the 260D I have remained very impressed with the musical quality this combination delivers. In fact, once past 100 hours of break-in on the 260D I was unable to detect any difference in the playback performance versus the initial hours. The 260D transport performs disc spinning tasks and digital signal delivery invisibly. Its disc tray functions are silky smooth, gliding in and out in near silence. The various control buttons, all of which are duplicated on the slim remote control, have excellent tactile feel and immediate response. The red LED display is striking and the digits are large enough to read from across the room. Should you choose, the display can be turned off, but will momentarily illuminate to show command changes, then returns to display off. The transport allows for a single repeat of the CD or continuous repeat, as well as programmed playback. The layout of the MOON Neo 260D transport controls is intuitive and takes no more than a few minutes to become second nature.
Listening to the 260D transport through the Yggdrasil DAC is pure joy. There is nothing about the playback quality from the transport that makes it readily identifiable from the Aurender N100H music server. In fact, the Gen5 USB input on the latest Yggdrasil DAC is so transparent it duplicates the same high degree of musicality as a CD playing in the 260D transport. I made direct comparisons of several CD’s against their FLAC file versions on the N100H and discovered both to be extremely close in sonic integrity, although on occasion CD playback from the 260D did manage a slightly more convincing sound stage, but for the most part the Aurender N100H music server and the MOON Neo 260D transport remained kissing cousins on one recording after another.
Some may question the need for a transport when a high-end music server is part of a sound system. I can understand the quizzical interest, but in my situation a transport provides one more useful source component that allows me to spin CD’s at will without having to first rip them on a computer, then drag and drop them on the server’s hard drive before being able to enjoy the recording. I have friends who visit and often bring a handful of CD’s they want to hear on my systems. Without a transport I would not be able to accommodate that request. In addition, sometimes I just feel like spinning CD’s, kind of like how I enjoy the ritual of playing LP’s. Handling the CD case, reading the CD booklet, placing the CD in the transport, and controlling it via the remote are all part of the fun. Some may see a transport in my sound system as redundant, but in the end I am the only one who has to be satisfied with the build and capabilities of my sound system, so I say to each their own.
I have not discovered a single thing about the Simaudio MOON Neo 260D transport that doesn’t please me. It is well constructed, simple and intuitive to operate, and performs its tasks silently. Playback quality is superb, although the DAC in use will always impact the final audible results. The combination of the MOON Neo 260D transport, Schiit Audio Yggdrasil DAC, and Wireworld Gold Starlight AES/EBU digital interconnect make for a formidable digital playback package that comes in under $5K. That is an incredibly attractive price point for a level of digital performance that easily stands toe to toe with competitors costing three times that price or more. I would not hesitate to recommend the Simaudio MOON Neo 260D transport to anyone looking to add CD playback to their DAC. If that DAC is the new Yggdrasil, all the better. This component combination provides consistently amazing digital performance.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4721/...934337cf_c.jpg
