Yamaha CDC-697

This product performs very well sonically. It seems to be constructed solidly (unlike some other manufacturers). It has one annoying design flaw: the carousel does not rotate (a good thing from a… mechanical reliability standpoint) and it does not extend out far enough from the player body when opened to allow clear access to the two rear CD slots (a not-so-good thing from an operating standpoint). The result is that when loading and unloading CDs from the two rear slots, it is difficult to avoid scratching the playing surface of the CD (one must be very careful when doing so). In addition, the controls are less than completely intuitive and the operating manual does not precisely reflect the controls on the unit. In spite of these minor shortcomings, I would purchase this unit again for it's solid construction and superior audio performance. I am a long-time Yamaha audio user and this product meets my expectations for their products with the exception of the design issue noted above.

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The player is one of the best carousel players I have ever owned. It recognizes and plays all my CD's without fail. I had trouble with my Onkyo CD player recognizing some of my CD's when I first put them… in. This player plays them immediately and sounds good as well. I have only a couple of minor complaints. One is the CD Text feature is not available with most CD's. If this feature is important to you, beware. Second, the characters on the display are small and hard to see from a distance. Other then that the player is meeting my expectations.

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Right after I finished copying all my LP's to CD my ancient Technics CD player died. It started skipping tracks on CDR's, then I noticed it was scratching the disks. I chose this deck mainly because… almost all my music is on CDR, and it claimed to read CDR and CDRW. It really does. It even plays the ones which got scratched by my old deck. I haven't found a single CD it won't play. Another reason I picked it was it had hardly any negative comments in Amazon, unlike competitors in the price range. And I will only be playing CD's so I didn't need multi-channel or MP3 or DVD capacity. Why get stuff you won't use, you either pay more or get less of what you do need. I'm not a hi-fi guru, so I won't try to add anything to the expert opinions about sound quality here. It does what it claims to do. It sounds great to me. It's easy to use and it seems to be solidly built. I've had it for a few weeks and I'm very happy with it.

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I have searched and reviewed and even owned other brands but the one that ALWAYS delivers is Yamaha. My entire Sound system is now Yamaha, (Surround Sound Amp, Speakers, CD changer). Why? Because they work… and deliver. This CD changer is easy to install, fast change when a selection is made, and produces true and full sound. My only complaint is that where we live in Central California, there are NO REPAIR services available, in the rare instance when one might be needed. If your looking for a quality, fast and reliable CD changer, look no further, you just found it. I have owned Sony and Dennon and they are not able to match the responsiveness of this unit (in my estimation).

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