SMSL VMV PL100 CD player £110

[ScottMob816]

No, it’s just a CD player. USB is only to power it, not an output.

Yeah. Was afraid of that. I put 2TB of internal SSD storage in my Nucleus One. Now I just need to figure out how to get stuff in there.

 

[DavidM1]

There's a Danish alternative that costs almost twice as much, Tangent CD II that offers nothing

View attachment 425054

Design wise, this is worse (sorry Denmark). The slot is the same colour as the face plate and probably invisible without a torch. The buttons are just as bad and there is no display. All it has going for it is conservative symmetry.

The blue/ green display on the PL100 has an appealing font and gives useful info. If you choose a track from the remote it confirms in large print before reverting to track time. You can safely check the volume level if using the internal dac. If anything, the display is the thing you tend to look at in use. I think SMSL did well with this CD player, especially as a transport.

 

[johny_2000]

Very quiet. I can’t hear it from my listening position so it seems much like streaming. I could hear the spin when I put my ear down to it.

SMSL said it uses Philips slot-in mechanism components. It would be interesting to see inside the device, what the mechanism and the PCB look like. It's not up to you to open it, I just can't find any photos of its insides on the Internet. Probably not many customers are geeky engineers

 

[DavidM1]

It's not up to you to open it

Couldn’t have put it better myself.

 

[Emmodd]

Yeah. Was afraid of that. I put 2TB of internal SSD storage in my Nucleus One. Now I just need to figure out how to get stuff in there.

Fiio dm13?

 

[aagstn]

I plan to use it only as a transport but with a spirit of enquiry I plugged in headphones and went back to Dark Side of the Moon.

It turns out that if using the internal DAC to a headphone out there is a very slight gap between tracks. More of a hiccup than a gap but a slight separation in any tones that should have been continuous. Unfortunate, but there it is.

So, I thought I’d double check the coax to external DAC result. At first I thought I detected a gap there as well so to clear any cache I ejected the CD and played another briefly then restarted DSOTM. No gaps and I paid particular attention to the transition between tracks 2 and 3 where there is a continuous sound playing. Definitely gapless there.

As far as I can tell the PL100 is gapless as a transport but has a tiny gap apparent between tracks when using the internal DAC and headphone out.

Is the result with my copy of Dark Side of the Moon typical of all gapless CDs? I don’t know but I would think it likely.

This is very encouraging. I know Yamaha was able to update their CD players for gapless so hopefully the trend of new CD players not supporting it will end. I love that we have quality options for new CD players in a reasonable price range. Most of mine are 15-30 years old and the clock is ticking on them.

 

[drmevo]

Has anyone replicated gapless via digital vs. analog out?

 

[ChenHui]

Yes, there are certainly other online shops and sellers still offering it to buy, but I'm saying it appears all of the official SMSL online storefronts are listing it as Unavailable. Go here: https://www.smsl-audio.com/portal/product/detail/id/904.html

And then click on any of the Purchase links to see what I mean.

Again, I may be reading too much into it, but why list it as Unavailable to buy at all when you could just say it's a few weeks out from shipping and still take orders like all of the other non-SMSL stores?

I think it's because PL100 is selling so well that there is not enough stock. It's not a wise choice to upgrade a product that has only been on the market for 3-4 months.
I checked today and found that it is available on the shop. Other websites are not available yet.

 

[Emmodd]

Has anyone replicated gapless via digital vs. analog out?

I've just gone straight from RCA to amp and there is a gap. Coax to dac no gap.

 

[drmevo]

I've just gone straight from RCA to amp and there is a gap. Coax to dac no gap.

Cool! Probably going to pick one up in that case. I’m not a big CD guy, in spite of (or perhaps due to) the fact it’s the format I grew up on after cassettes. But I do have a small collection and my 13-year-old is into them, go figure.

There are lots of folks on YouTube comments, etc., questioning why gapless is so important. For me, besides being part of the Redbook standard, and a few of the classic albums that are mostly gapless, there are many, many albums with gapless tracks sprinkled in, in just about every genre, and we’re not meant to hear a pause between them. I know most here get that, but it seems like a lot of people think it’s just DSOTM and albums like that where it matters.

 

[aagstn]

Cool! Probably going to pick one up in that case. I’m not a big CD guy, in spite of (or perhaps due to) the fact it’s the format I grew up on after cassettes. But I do have a small collection and my 13-year-old is into them, go figure.

There are lots of folks on YouTube comments, etc., questioning why gapless is so important. For me, besides being part of the Redbook standard, and a few of the classic albums that are mostly gapless, there are many, many albums with gapless tracks sprinkled in, in just about every genre, and we’re not meant to hear a pause between them. I know most here get that, but it seems like a lot of people think it’s just DSOTM and albums like that where it matters.

It boggles my mind people question why gapless is important. I have dozens of albums from the Beatles, Rush, Alan Parsons Project, Yes, Pink Floyd and on and on that have sections where one song flows seamlessly into the next. Hip-Hip also used this to go from a song straight into a skit and then right into the next song. Most of my classical music and rock live albums are a continuous performance. It is important and I really don't understand why this feature got left behind with many CD players in the 2010s and 2020s when it is part of the Redbook standard.

It does seem there is hope though. This player at least functions correctly as a transport and I've read that the recent players from Moondrop also supported gapless. CD really suffered when Sony and Phillips abandoned it. We are left with Chinese manufacturers to fill the gap and that can be a bad thing as I've seen with formats like cassette.

 

[daniel505]

I've just gone straight from RCA to amp and there is a gap. Coax to dac no gap.

For me there is no gap, even on RCA out, provided I just let the CD play. However, if I skip forward in the track to go to the time right before the gap to test it, there suddenly is a gap.

 

[daniel505]

And while I have no issues with gapless playback, there are some other minor issues. Nothing too bad, just good to be aware of if you think about buying this.

• Inserting a disc and pressing play before the TOC is fully loaded makes the player hang on a “READ” state. There is a play icon on the screen, but the CD never starts. So it's not possible to queue the play action. This hang state be solved by pressing stop and then start again. You have to insert the CD, wait 3-5 seconds for the TOC to load and the player to display total time, and then press play.
• The display doesn't go completely off when in standby. Instead, it appears to go to the lowest brightness setting. See the attached photo. This was taken with the night mode of my phone, so it really over-accentuate the issue. It's noticeable, but it's not as if it lights up the whole room. The LED next to the screen is from the PL100, the bottom LED from the receiver. (There's also a possibility that this is caused by a reflection of the LED on the screen, instead of the screen being actually on.)
• The refresh rate of the screen is low, and the way the timer is updated is a bit strange, or not really smooth. It's visible in some videos about this player on YouTube as well.
• Sometimes the timer misses a second on the screen, so it jumps from 0:37 to 0:39. Of course this has no impact on the music, that just plays as normal.

 

[threni]

For me there is no gap, even on RCA out, provided I just let the CD play. However, if I skip forward in the track to go to the time right before the gap to test it, there suddenly is a gap.

I guess you're not giving it enough time to read in advance the next n seconds and handle the gap.

 

[DavidM1]

As far as I can tell the PL100 is gapless as a transport but has a tiny gap apparent between tracks when using the internal DAC and headphone out.

I was wrong! It turns out the PL100 can play entire CDs gaplessly but fast forward to cue up a transition point results in a transition gap for both headphone and coax outputs i.e. internal and external DAC.

There you go. The PL100 is gapless for playing entire CDs but using >> and << can introduce gaps. It’s not dependent on internal vs external DAC.

 

[DavidM1]

The PL100 is gapless for playing entire CDs but using >> and << can introduce gaps. It’s not dependent on internal vs external DAC.

I realise this thread has just about reached a natural ending but I thought I'd make one last comment about the whole "gapless" issue. I've tried starting specific tracks on DSOTM from the remote and the player continues to later tracks gaplessly. Likewise, switching to another track while part way through a track also retains gapless play. Using the >> means that subsequent gapless transitions will have a small, artificial gap. However, pressing stop and then choosing a track to continue with returns the player to gapless playing.

For me, the PL100 is a gapless player. If I'm not listening to a CD from the beginning I will likely be selecting a track number to hear. I can't remember ever using the >> function on my last CD player and I probably won't call on it much with this one.

I now know that I can select any multi-movement work that starts at any track number and it will play through later transitions between movements without hiccups. I hope someone else finds all this helpful. I have definitely listened to this Pink Floyd CD enough and my curiosity is quenched!

 

[Blew]

Using the >> means that subsequent gapless transitions will have a small, artificial gap.

It sounds like a firmware bug that needs fixing.

 

[ziggurcat]

It sounds like a firmware bug that needs fixing.

I would be curious how a FW update could be implemented given that there's no USB input for data (unless the one on the unit acts as both power and data transfer).

 

[Tlow98]

What power source are you guys using?

I’m seeing the IFi units, but not many linear power supplies in the 5v/2.4a variety.

What am I missing?

 

[DavidM1]

What power source are you guys using?

I’m seeing the IFi units, but not many linear power supplies in the 5v/2.4a variety.

What am I missing?

The power board for my stereo has a couple each of usb A and usb C outputs. Both work. I tend to think of linear power supplies as phooey.

Power board