The French Metronome has released the new CD player: Le Player 3, an ‘affordable’ entry point for enthusiasts.
To put it bluntly: affordable is a very relative term. The Metronome Le Player 3 costs €4600, which is an attractively priced device according to the manufacturer. This is a DAC-less player (i.e. a CD transport) that concentrates on getting the most out of the old silver discs. For this purpose, it converts CD audio (16 bit / 44 kHz) to DSD 128. This signal is then fed out via an I2S HDMI output.
Loads of outputs
According to Metronome, the fact that no DAC is built in has everything to do with the freedom for the consumer. After all, they can now use their preferred DAC and thus get the best out of the CDs in terms of sound quality. Luckily there are more outputs aside the I2S HDMI output, you can think of: S/PDIF RCA, AES/EBU XLR, and optical Toslink. Furthermore, the Metronome Le Player 3 has a very decent power supply, the basis of which is formed by three toroidal transformers. Finally, to put the price in perspective: the Le Player 3 costs about one tenth of Metronome’s flagships.