In the recent Stereophile Buyer's guides there are two great articles listing the re viewer's favorite "reference" CDs and what you should look for when using them. These are real albums, not just test tones or test CDs. Those can be useful too, but I never use that sort of thing for overall equipment evaluation. More to diagnose a problem, or for setting up a new room.

If your purpose is for taking them for listening/buying sessions I think it's essential to also bring some of your own favorite recordings, regardless of genre or how well they are recorded. In the end, that's what you'll be listening to, not the "audiophile" reference list. Hope that helps!

Go to Stereophile's home page and scroll down to "Records To Die For", then follow the links. Spend a little time looking there and you'll come up with a shopping list of quality CDs. Also look at www.acousticsounds.com When you browse recordings you'll see a list of lists down the left side. Acoustic Sounds is a great place to buy high quality, hard to find records, whether CD, SACD, DVD-A or vinyl.

BTW, you can buy a universal player from Oppo for under $200. Still, stick with CDs for now, since SACDs and DVD-As are often screwed up with surround signals and afterthought production of the 2-channel bits.

When you get your audiophile legs you can branch into other formats.
Dave

May I also recommend Music Direct?
I have bought a couple of CD's from them; great stuff!
One is a Bluegrass Sampler(yep, I love that "hick" music) from Acoustic Sounds & the other is the 30th Anniversary sampler from Reference Recordings. Wow!!
Both sound great on my lil budget system! I can't wait to hear them on the Oppo DV- 980 H(soon I hope!).
A great thing about Music Direct is that I have a wishlist there that I can add discs to for future buying.