Shanling CD-3000

CD-3000 The Shanling CD-3000 was a well built tube CD player in its stock form. It was a very good deal at its $1595 retail price. If made in the US by one of the "big boys", it would easily sell in the $3000+ price range.
The CD-3000 uses the best Burr Brown DAC, the PCM-1794, the Burr-Brown SRC1492 24-bit/192kHz upsampling processor and a very fine Phillips CD7 MKII top loading transport that is coupled to a better clock than most units at twice its price. This lowers jitter.

The balanced output employs 4 x Burr Brown OPA-627 opamps, the best made. Tubes are two Electro Harmonix 6922s. These are dramatically better than the cheap Chinese tubes used in most offshore players. Digital and analog sections are powered by two separate transformers.

We loved this player for the money. The stock player was a good buy at its $1595 price as it was built like a tank. We have designed multiple modifications for the player and can say that they are exceptional at the prices that we are selling them for. With the Mini mod at $675 to your player, the Level-1 at $2490 or our full Level-2 mod with clock at $3390. The Level-2 plus clock mod outperforms our top mod on the T-200. That player was compared to their $13,000 reference player by 6moons.com and they felt that we might be better.

The following details the Mini mod for the CD-3000 $675 + freight retrofit to your player:

  • 2 x BlackGate STD-grade electrolytic power supply capacitors
  • 4 x Riken Ohm ½ and one watt signal path 1% carbon comp. resistors with gold-plated leads
  • We replace the stock $5 dual I-V op amps with the world's best, the $25/ea. Burr-Brown OPA-627 in a special single DIP module - we use 2 pieces total
  • 2 x 3uf Auricap metalized polypropylene output coupling caps
  • One pair of premium machined Vampire direct gold-plated over copper body Teflon insulated RCA female jacks to replace the cheap stamped jack modules on the output
  • 1 x sheet of SoundCoat chassis damping material cut and applied where applicable to control chassis resonances
  • 4 x pieces of DH Labs 99.999% pure solid-core long-grained silver output signal wires with foamed Teflon tape wrap dielectric
  • WBT 4% silver content solder used throughout
  • 3.5 hours total labor


Sonic improvements of the Mini mod
The unit is quieter, blacks are blacker to resolve more low-level detail and ambience. Bass slam and extension are improved with fuller weight and authority. The unit now sounds more like solid-state in this area and competes with much more expensive players. Dynamics are improved over the stock player. High frequencies are extended with a little more sparkle. It is a tad warmer with a more liquid midrange. Images are sized better and defined. Stage width and depth are both improved. Transparency is improved and you can now look farther into the soundstage. The Mini Mod takes the stock player up to the level of most $3500 stock players. We believe that it is the player to beat in the under $2k price range.

The following details the Level-1 mod for the CD-3000 $1150 + freight retrofit to your player  modified players come with the one year warranty on mod work:

  • 1 pair of premium machined Vampire direct gold plated over copper body Teflon insulated RCA female jacks on the output to replacethe cheap stamped jack modules
  • 1 sheet of SoundCoat chassis damping material cut and applied where applicable to control chassis resonances
  • 4 pieces of DH Labs 99.999% pure solid-core long-grained silver output signal wires with foamed Teflon tape wrap dielectric.
  • 14 BlackGate STD and FK-grade PS caps, NX-grade DAC PS Caps and N -rade output coupling capacitors
  • 10 Riken Ohm ½ and one watt signal path 1% carbon comp. resistors with gold-plated leads
  • 4 x IR Hexfred ultra-fast soft recover rectifying diodes in the power supply
  • Replace stock I-V op amps with world's best BurrBrown OPA-627 in a special single DIP module – 2 pcs. total
  • 2 x Multicap PPFX-S polypropylene film and tin foil input coupling caps
  • 2 x 3uf Auricap metalized polypropylene line output caps
  • WBT high silver content (4%) solder used throughout
  • 6 hours total labor


Options: Add a DEXA Super Clock to lower jitter - $480

Modify the balanced output side of the machine - $380

The following details the Level-2 mod for the CD-3000 $1750 + freight retrofit to your player. Modified players come with the one year factory warranty].

  • 1 pair of premium machined Vampire direct gold plated over copper body Teflon insulated RCA female jacks on the output. These replace the cheap stamped nickel metal jack modules of the stock player.
  • 29 x BlackGate STD and FK grade power supply caps, NX grade DAC PS caps and N-grade output coupling capacitors
  • 20 x Riken Ohm ½ and one watt signal path 1% carbon comp. resistors with gold-plated leads
  • 8 x International Rectifier Hexfred ultra-fast soft recover rectifying diodes in the power supply
  • We replace the stock $5 I-V dual op amps with the world's best, 4 x single Burr-Brown OPA-627s in a special single DIP module. We basically make dual opamps from the 627s to replace the duals of the stock player. We use 4 pcs. total and 2 custom DIP boards.
  • 2 x MultiCap PPFX-S Polypropylene film and tin foil coupling caps
  • 2 x 0.01uf with Rel-Cap TFT Teflon film and tin foil bypass coupling caps to add sparkle and extension to the high frequencies.
  • 2 x 3uf Auricap metalized polypropylene line output caps
  • 4 x Polystyrene film and tin foil analog filter caps
  • 2 x Multicap PPMFX metalized polypropylene analog filter caps
  • 1 x matched pair of NOS (new-old stock) Reflektor mil-spec ultra low noise 6H23p-eb. These are super 6922.
  • 2 x 5x20mm 1A, slo-blo; 1 x 5x20mm 200ma slo-blo pure silver HiFi Tuning fuses (German made)
  • 1 x sheet of SoundCoat chassis damping material cut and applied where applicable to control chassis resonances
  • 4 x pieces of DH LABS 99.999% pure solid-core long-grained silver output signal wires with foamed Teflon tape wrap dielectric
  • WBT 4% silver content solder used throughout
  • 8 hours total labor.


Options
Add a DEXA Super Clock to lower jitter for $480. New Level-2 players with the clock are $3,390 + frt

Sonic Improvements of the Level-2 mod
The unit is quieter, blacks are blacker to resolve more low-level detail and ambience. Bass slam and extension are dramatically improved, with much fuller weight and authority. The unit now sounds more like the best solid-state players in this area and competes with anything that we have heard in this area under $10k. Dynamics are greatly improved over the stock player. High frequencies are extended with more detail, extension and sparkle. Midrange is more palpable with more warmth and detail. Images are sized better and are more defined. Soundstage width and depth are now both second to none at this price. Transparency is greatly improved and you can now look farther into the soundstage.

The Level-2 Mod takes the stock player up to the Level of most $10k stock players. We believe that it is the player to beat at anywhere close to this price.

Shanling