I bought this CD Player as replacement of my old NAD C521i.

I don't simply runned the first store and bought the first player that I saw, no. This player was chosen after intesive tests in a professionnal recording studio. During those tests, I tried out different Accuphase Players like the DP-400, DP-410, DP-500, a Moon By Simaudio 260D, a Luxman D-05, one Onkyo C-7000R, two exposure (CD-3010 and CD-2010), different Nad players, some bad Naim stuff (CD 5Si), a Yamaha CD-S2000 and S-3000, a few Cambridge players, some pre-bankrupcy Technics and this Denon.

I'm somebody that likes a realistic restitution, or, at least, the nearest to that is putted by the sound engineer on the disc. I'm using a very revealing hifi chain in form of an Accuphase C-2110 preamp, on a Restek Event power amp. The result is send to a pair of PMC Fact8 speakers.

I had many good players on this test, and with exception of the Naim, no one was really that "worser" than the others.

Atfter two years of intensive listening, three players was above the others in my preference I give to them. The Accuphase DP-400, because of his neutrality and natural sound in every situation. But he was creepingly exepensive. Even a used one would easily cost more than 2'500$.

The Exposure 3010 was although a very good one, but his overall quality was worse than the two other and the service in my land is not as good as the two others. Although, he's difficult to find used.

And the Denon DCD-S10ii, that was not that neutral than the Accuphase, but so incredibly less that it's flirting everytime with the limit of psycho-accustic. He was sturdy built, has the same sense of detail, was dynamic too. A great player.

What pleased me the most is that this player is nearly unknown and so, the prices on the used market are really cheap. 250$ for an accuphase level player was, for me, a very good deal.

As mentionned before, the player is not totally perfect/neutral. The bass is set up to be a little bit lower. No problem, you will hear plenty of them, but it's not forward, it's not boomy. It's a tight, natural controlled bass on a level around-2db of the rest of the frequencies. This is an audiophonic trick, that is although used by some others, for giving a better audible medium. On this player, everything since the low medium seem to be much easyer to identify. It's precise without beeing analytic, and it's not pushed forward. It's just there. The highs are excellent and on high level, there is nothing much to write about it.

The player works incredibly well on singer. But, in fact, it's an allrounder. I'm listening IDM, Metal, Rock, Blues, Classic, World Music, Traditionnal music, and a lot more, and he's good on everything.

He will just need a good chain to express at his full potential. Not really critic on the cable topic and he's cheap on the used market.

musical,clean,fast,nice looking,top build- quality.

Cheap cabling

Great cd player.After having the Rotel-971 which is probably one of the best for the price,i upgraded the sistem with this Denon s10-II(couldnt afford s-1)and it seems that it's going to sing for a longer period.Clean,clear,articulate sound.The bass is deep and controlled,the focus is excelent.It has a wonderfool, musical pressentation with most of the recordings,of every instrument,but olso plays nice with big classical simfonies. It's a nice looking hi-end product,and the build quality makes you thing it cost at least twice of the price.Maybe there is better machines for the price,I will soon compare it with my friends Marantz-14 The only thing I dont like,is the ordinary power cable wich I replaced with some other shilded cables,and the internal wiring,which I replac,ed with VanDenHul-cs-18,Wich is probably some of the best wiring in the world.I know that becouse my pre/amp use this wiring,and since Idid a lot of experiments with the internal wiring of the preamp,cs-18 is the best signal wire,and the last big progress with the wiring was when I made a pair of interconects using 4 cs-18 wires.That really made me asking my self was it a good investment buing all this cables in the past(VDH-silver,kimber KCAG,MIT-2,etc) They realy take the signal from the botomm to the end. Other equpment: Korato amp 2x100w(dual-mono-2x 500v-torodial)made in Serbia-the best amp for the price Korato-preamp(dual-mono valve,with separate power suply-just great Apogee-minor-speakers VDH-revelation speaker cables-also great VDH-silver interconect-one of the best but very expensive-2000$-metar pair MIT-2 int.(exscelent audioquest-ruby-nice warm,tube kind of sound B&w-asw-1000 sub.nice but Iwill trade it for matrix 800 which is even better

Similar Products Used:

Rotel-971,cheaper Denon models,Aura

i like it is so cool

before buy this cdplayer i m use marantz 17mkII
but now i use denon DCD-S10II only it is so Strength

Pace, timing accuracy, clean, powerful sound. Excellent built quality, good looks

None at this sort of price

Built like a tank, uses separate power supply for all critcal components, able to rival powerhouse from Krell, Classe, Accuphase...

When I saw this guy, I know I am in for a treat. The Chassis is awesomely constructed, the transposrt is held in place using a floating mechanism to minimize vibration. Denon famous Alpha process is ultilized to smooth out digital errors present on the CD format and the signal is pass thru 4 DAC for processing.

The result?

Absolutely smooth, clear, very involving high end sound. This guy is able to take on the most expensive Cdplayers head on!!! Imaging is spot on, timing is exceptional, midrange is clear, bass is tight....I could go on forever.

The Denon S-series stuff are not easy to come by, but if you really happen to spot one, give it a listen....you will be amazed!

Similar Products Used:

Krell 250, Sony XA5es, XA7es, Rega Jupiter, Meridien, Classe

I've had this deck now for about 6 months, and have found that I avoid using it except as a digital source deck. It makes CDs sound cold and sibilant. It takes the pleasure out of listening to music so I'm now looking around for another player.