New SACD player from Sony: SCD-XA5400ES with DSD over HDMI

SCD-XA5400ES: The Super Audio CD player for the true music lover

For those who want the ultimate sound quality from audio discs, the new ES range features the SCD-XA5400ES Super Audio CD/CD player, designed to deliver superlative audio quality from stereo and multi-channel software.

This is Sony’s first Super Audio CD player to allow the transfer of Super Audio CD’s native Direct Stream Digital audio format over HDMI, and ensures a perfect transfer to its matching AV receiver, the STR-DA5400ES via Sony’s H.A.T.S., or High-quality digital Audio Transfer System. This allows the AV receiver to control the flow of data from the player, and this, in association with buffering in the AV receiver, ensures the smoothest possible transfer between the two – and the best possible sound.

 

If the player is used with other amplifiers or AV receivers it employs its high-quality Super Audio CD conversion system, which uses the equivalent of 12 separate digital-to-analogue converters, to output the audio as stereo analogue, either on phono or balanced XLR connectors, or as conventional multi-channel audio via HDMI.

This is a player built to perform; as well as the remarkable H.A.T.S. system it uses a super-rigid frame and beam chassis and utilises separate R-Core power supply transformers for the audio and digital/control sections.

And just in case you thought CD had been forgotten, the SCD-XA5400ES plays those too, as well as CD-R/RW discs. The designers have even used a twin-laser system to ensure the machine plays both Super Audio CDs and CDs to the same standard: there’s a dedicated laser for each kind of disc, ensuring it is read as accurately as possible.