Disc Players

Early CD players from Philips and Sony are considered by some collectors to be the most covetable vintage models because they came from the very companies that created the format. You can add to this list machines from Denon, whose Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) system underpinned the way analogue signals were transformed into digital data, recorded, played back and finally turned back into music again.

When Hegel announced its Viking CD player, the phrase 'never say never again' sprung to mind. You don't need to have a particularly long memory to recall the company's previous silver-disc spinner was named Mohican [HFN Oct '16] because – geddit? – it was going to be the last such machine the Norwegian company would make. The format's popularity was seemingly dwindling in the face of music streaming and the vinyl resurgence. Hegel even made commemorative t-shirts for its final fling with CD.

The appearance of portable CD players in the mid 1980s presented buyers with something of a dilemma. Should they purchase a full-width model or one of the mobile machines, almost all of which could easily be connected to a full-sized system? A portable would be more versatile, but a large player would be expected to offer more facilities and better sound quality.

The Denon duo in the limelight here are an obvious refresh of the previous generation DCD-1600NE disc player and PMA-1600NE amp, introduced in 2017, rather than entirely new designs. Partly that's because both the £1299 DCD-1700NE and £1699 PMA-1700NE look very similar, if not identical, to their predecessors. The solid construction, metal front fascia that curves to ensure the Denon logo catches the light, the weighty volume knob in the middle of the amp, the old-school tone controls… it's all very par for the course, as is the choice between black or silver colourways.

It has been ten years, shy of a month, since a Sanyo product last appeared in the HFN Vintage Review pages. This was the Fisher AD 800 [HFN Apr '13], the company's first ever CD player, which was marketed in the UK under the firm's specialist hi-fi and video brand.

One of the many impressive achievements of the early CD era was the way in which the price of players remained constant, or even fell, as the technology used inside them improved. The first machines were masterpieces, beautifully constructed utilising the best materials and processes. However, it was soon realised that when it came to the basic task of playing a disc, much could be stripped away, and in the years that followed the format's release this was exactly what began to happen.

Think about portable CD players and the chances are that the Sony Discman [HFN Jul '19] will come to mind. The company's ability to produce enchanting and compelling miniature versions of existing products has been pretty much unequalled, and 'the world's smallest' is a phrase that can often be seen in Sony's vintage catalogues. In comparison, the company's larger models were frequently bland and derivative.