Has anyone noticed the generally poor quality of CD's? As I spend more time really listening to recordings instead of just having background music on I am more disappointed. Trying to tweek my system I find myself relying on just a few CD's to reference. It is frustrating and I wonder if others feel the same. Also what are your reference CD's?

cubdog

Well, it depends - there is a lot of variability, both in the CD's themselves and ini players. Right now I'm listening to a CD of an old Thelonius Monk Quartet album and it sounds great.

What are you using for a CD player and what specific CDs are you listening to? My humble Rotel 955 CD player is very smooth, much better than the Marantz DVD player in the same system.

And yeah, CD sound quality varies, of course, depending upon the recording and engineering. So did (does) vinyl quality.

There are some smaller labels out there that take a lot of pride in putting out quality recordings - Chesky and Mapleshade come immediately to mind. Check them out sometime.