Mcintosh MCD1000

The MCD1000 Transport has one unbalanced coaxial (RCA), one Toslink optical, and one balanced XLR output. The unit uses an Optical Three-Beam Laser Pickup, Two-Dimensional Parallel Objective Lens Drive System, and GaAIAs Semiconductor Laser. Error Correction is Cross Interleave Reed Solomon. The Green LED front panel can display Disc Time, Total Remaining Time, Track Time, and Remaining Track Time. Two mini phone jacks are provided for remote control data in/out. Thick machined aluminum top and side panels are used.

CD Transport MCD1000 is exactly what the name states: a CD drive. Built according to the many years long tradition of the company it is extremely solid and designed to remain an attractive proposition for years to come, to survive many fashion changes. Its front is made of glass. In difference to cheaper units, the front is split into three parts, with the middle one, containing the disc tray and display, protruding. The tray has no special cover at the front, we see directly the tray itself made from cast aluminum, and beautifully finished. The display is small and contains a track calendar and I really do not understand why it there could be no readable, big display installed, like in the partnering DAC. The backlight above the buttons is green (classic) and the light is supplied via optic fiber, due to that the front panel does not get hot and the varnish remains intact. The sides of the panel are locked in aluminum rails. Since late 90-ties those have increased their size the company started with flat elements, now they are almost square in cross-section. The top cover is also special it is a thick aluminum sheet placed atop of a glass cover.

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There is a window cut in the aluminum layer, and there we see a block diagram painted on the glass below this looks kind similar to Nagra. Closer to the front there is a large aluminum McIntosh logo placed on a gold plated plate, which gives a nice contrast to the otherwise black enclosure. The side panels are made from thick aluminum plates. On the back we see a variety of digital outputs balanced electrical AES/EBU (XLR), two unbalanced electrical S/PDIF (RCA) and two optical S/PDIF (TOSLINK). As we can learn from the manual, the signal fed to the outputs is conform to the one on the disc 16/44.1.