Realised the other day that my two main sources are at opposite extremes: the combination of Notts Analogue and Hadcock couldn't be more basically mechanical if it tried and even the electro-mechanical bit is, in essence, a straightforward bit of engineering and then the SD card player I use to feed my DAC is about as solid state as it gets. I'm not sure, but it may illustrate why I never really liked the CD as a format; digital replay but still with a reliance on the mechanical; it was the mechanical bit giving up on a fairly recent player that nudged me in the direction of memory based playback in the first place. There was a thread here recently about the same card based player that I use but what I find surprising is that given that solid state music players have become ubiquitous in recent years it's taken so long for them to appear in the audiophile market (that said the QLS is still a work in progress in my view). Prior to finding this player I was looking into using a big iPod with a suitable (ie digital-out) dock. As the basis for a system I think this kind of device has a lot going for it - but why has it taken so long for them to appear in the hi-fi sector? Why not use a computer though- well lots of reasons really but one of the foremost being that I'm coming to prefer bits of equipment that just do the one thing.
