CES 2009

Boulder 1021 Disc Player

Jon Iverson  |  Jan 14, 2009  |  First Published: Jul 13, 2009

I'm still amazed at the sheer number of new high-end CD players announced at this show. Either someone didn't get the memo about the disc format's impending demise, or else we've entered that phase, as with turntables, that playback advances will continue to win new customers with big collections.

Boulder's new $24,000 1021 is a case in point. An on-board computer buffers the data coming off the transport and manipulates everything in software. The large and easy-to-read front panel display has a small gray bar at the bottom to indicate how much data is ahead in the buffer ahead as the music is playing.

The 1021 uses an interesting approach to get the track names to pop up on the display: inside the box is data for 250,000 "popular" discs. If you load in a disc that is not in the on-board database, it searches the internet for the info which it then keeps on hand for the next time you insert that disc.

COMMENTS
KBK's picture
Submitted by KBK (not verified) on January 15, 2009 - 9:45am

Anyone remember the slightly better sonics that the 'active lifestyle' oriented cheaply made data buffered portable CD players brought to the audiophile table? Hmmm? Odd that over the years that so few manufacturers took advantage of this known point. Th real issue is likely that implementations of such schemes are beyond the financial means of most audio companies, with regards to the design and execution of such.

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