While listening to the two HF EDITION players one right after another, in different combinations, it is easy to come to the conclusion that these are very similar devices, i.e. that they are more different from other digital players available on the market than from each other. Their sound has developed on the basis of the same foundations and aesthetics, which makes them appear to be the same to a random person – perhaps not identical, but similar enough for the listener to regard the differences between them as irrelevant. However, I assume that High Fidelity readers are no random listeners, but people who know what they want and are well-prepared for the challenge. Therefore, the differences between the models may prove to be the key to getting to the place where they would like to be sonically. As far as they are concerned, the shifts in emphasis, a slight change of perspective and apparently slight differences will prove bigger than one may assume based on reading the previous paragraph. For those listeners these may be “to be or not to be” differences.

It is because these are not “the same” players. Obviously, they sound alike and use a similar approach to building sound, but, paradoxically in the context of the first paragraph, the differences between them would make it easier for me to compare either of them to another manufacturer’s top-of-the-range player, e.g. the fantastic Gryphon Ethos, or Esoteric K-01XD, and to talk about the similarities between them, rather than compare the CD-35 HF Edition and CD-35 II HF Edition.

Some of the characteristics, however, are clearly different, e.g. perspective. The new player builds it in a completely different way. While the Mk I shows events fairly close, saturates them in order to make their 3D images large and tangible, the Mk II presents the foreground in a larger distance from us, though not too much, ca. one meter further away. My player attempts to saturate the musical message with emotions through quite a close presentation and to ensure the best energy transfer possible – the closer we sit to a sound source, the more tangible and direct it is, right?

Well – yes and no – while listening to the CD-35 II HF Edition, we will notice that tangibility and energy transfer can be “dealt with” in a different way. By moving the foreground further away from us, the device makes it focused and enlarged. That is right, we get a more condensed image with it, placed further away from the line connecting the loudspeakers, but also one that is larger. “Condensing the image” most often entails making it smaller, since if the same information has got to be clearer, it also has to be condensed. And this is what usually happens, but not here – not with the MkII.