best player for under RM10K?

more than a year ago, my audio buddy was in search of a cd player under rm20k. he auditioned many models, including my meridian g08, but ended up buying bladelius freja. he thinks g08 is too forward in its midrange, which to me, is really a matter of taste and system matching but i gather that his bladelius freja must be smoother-sounding than the g08.

to see how well a company is doing internationally, all you need is google. with bladelius, you see many websites with different languages popping up. which goes to show how well bladelius is being distributed globally and how aggressive their international marketing arm is.

RM10K is a very special price point for hifi in malaysia. it is neither expensive nor cheap, so products fall under this price point have a special attraction to cost-conscious malaysian audiophiles.

bladelius freja (now in mkII guise), at Rm15K, is way too expensive for mid-enders but way too cheap for high-enders. realising this, bladelius has come out with syn (pronounced as "sine", i was told) which provides a much less painful path to owning a bladelius cd player. at below RM10K, there are really not many top-tier products that are competing. off hand, i could think of meridian g06, rega saturn and ayre cx-7e (both could be slightly more than RM10K).

in bladelius' term, syn affordable. the high-grade 24bits/192kHz burr-brown DAC as well as the improved power supply optimizes a outstanding analogue sonic quality. isolated chassis design to separate the transport mechanism and DAC part is the best method to illuminate all un-necessary resonance.

bladelius claims that "syn gives the best sounding source in entry level range which no one can be able to achieve".

a bold claim that only you can testify. eugene (012-3222698) of audio matic @ amcorp mall is more than happy to accomodate your curiosity.

but beware, curiosity may kill the audio cat ;-)