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Does anyone have direct experience with the older Marantz SA8004 (or SA8005) and the more recent Ruby KI? I've got an itch to buy the Ruby based on my long term enjoyment with the SA8004. I would use a disc spinner and streaming DAC in my primary system.
TIA,
Jim
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I hear an SA8004 fairly regularly at a friend's house. Nice machine, plays music rather then just making hifi sounds.
I haven't, however, heard it in comparison the to the Ruby KI but the latter has two things that may well make it preferable. It was the swan song product of the late Ken Ishiwata and it has the recent D&M CD/SACD transport (SACDM-3)as used in the SA10 and as adopted by other high end manufacturers such as dCS. The cost of the transport presumably accounting for some of the price of the Ruby which here in the UK is over double the cost of what the 8004 was, irrespective of RPI.
"We need less, but better" - Dieter Rams
I have a KI ruby and it is excellent. The upsampling to 4x dsd really smooths the sound. This may be the last sacd player from marantz that does this. Buy it before they are gone.
Yes, that upsampling to DSD does wonders for CDs too. My CD collection has never sounded so good.
Jack
I've been weighing up investing in a Ruby KI, and I'm wondering how the DAC functions on it. I'd be interested in replacing my separate DAC with one integrated into a SACD player. I stream from a hard drive a lot, though, so I'm concerned about its ability to handle high-bit files. I'd appreciate any feedback,
JB Coleman
It was designed to handle pretty much any digital format you throw at it.
Jack
I think the Ruby KI is very similar to the SA10 in most aspects. I recently purchased an SA10 and use the USB connection to the DAC from my computer running Audirvana, (through PS Audio Lanrover). This works very well, and seems to handle high resolution DSD files with no problem. Of course,
Audirvana is doing a lot of the work here, but the SA10 does work much better than the SA14 I had before.
but sadly only single ended RCA outputs. :-(
Got to go to the SA-10 for balanced outputs.
But still, if that's not an issue this should be ones last silver disk spinner.
And do it quickly because it's about over for Marantz.
Visited the Marantz/Polk Audio room at RMAF last year and the guy running the room (Polk audio guy?) didn't even know who Ken Ishiwata was, and Ken was still alive at that point albeit recently retired.
Why do you think it is just about over for Marantz? They still have quite a presence at places like Best Buy, for example (Mostly video receiver).
Marantz likely becomes a consumer brand, and sells at Best Buy, but I think products like the Ruby KI and SA10 are the last of a long line of really top products for Marantz.
No, I got it at Music Direct. Best Buy has a "Magnolia" division which carries some high-end audio, and I did ask a salesman I know there about the SA10, but he never answered my email. My point was that Marantz's presence there seems pretty stable, so I think the company should be too. It is true that this doesn't guarantee that they will continue to innovate in audio. But I think there is a new SA12 available now in Japan, perhaps eventually in the U.S., which is something like the Ruby. Still, I agree that the Ruby might be a good bet now....last I looked there were good deals on them at Music Direct. I probably should have gotten one of those instead of the SA10, since I don't need balanced outputs.
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