This gorgeous unassuming player delivers the goods. Very smooth neutral presentation with not a hint of brightness and deep tuneful vibrant bass. Basically the kind of sound you get only in megabuck players. I know of no budget player that can beat it, except the Denon A100, and only by a hair (I’ve had some good ones in my system – MCD201, Cambridge 840, Marantz 8001 & 8004, Sony 5400, Jolida 100, NAD 565, Emotiva ERC). The Denon is a tad more vivid and better in low end impact. But the two are similar enough in sound that they could've been models in the same line. Might as well because they share the same smooth quiet metal transport and aluminum tray (rumored to be similar to the one in the $6K MCD500). Like the Denon, the C7000R has bulk and weighs a hefty 26 pounds (both have big linear power supplies). This goes to show that in the world of cd players (and audio equipment in general) the most important spec to look for is weight if you care about sound. DVD and universal players using lightweight switchmode supplies don't come close in my opinion to providing the same listening experience as players such as the Onkyo C7000R and Denon A100.

First impression: rock solid - player comes built from seperate aluminum housing plates, total weight is 12 kg. this continues on the inside where 2 different power supply units feed digital and the other the analog signal processing line and the drive is mounted an subframe, all solid metal.
Paired with Linn Majik-i (old series) integrated amp and Linn Katan speakers the player might not show its weak spots due to the generation gap (90s vs 2010s) and it doesn't. All the details come clean, bass is playful. The tempo is just in time. Everything perfect now you can ask. Well, the player doesn,t give much air or coloration into the performance. Just as much as the recording forces it to. Coming from vinyl i had to adjust to the sober mentality of the Onkyo. But as with a sober friend, it's not really fun to mess with. I think it is a good product because i can play albums that just don't work on my rega p3 elys setup like powerfull recordings and others that are just not to get on vinyl for normal people. the player has a feature that allows you to adjust the filter of dac section from sharp(flat output) to soft (more analog sounding) but the difference was not very much affecting sound. default is sharp. so you can play with that when in a listening room, it is the setup key on the remote, then audio, filter, that's that. so far i am proud of my cd player that plays like from a massive rock.