So perhaps there is a better drive that can fit our great player (BCD-1) ? 
I have had some customers ask why we chose this specific Phillips L1210 CD Drive for our current BCD-1 CD Player.
The search for the drive was not an easy task. The problem is that there are not many ‘CD dedicated’ drives out there. By CD dedicated I mean ones that have a ‘clocking’ frequency which is a multiple of the 44.1KHz, which is the standard for Redbook CD. Most drives are DVD drives which play CD’s and have clocking frequencies in the mega-Hz region and have to be converted to a lower clock frequencies to play a CD. By the way, this is true of the SACD drives we looked at which also are typically DVD drives that play CD’s and SACD’s.
We wanted to optimize the Redbook CD Playback so we were restricted to certain available drives. We looked at 5 different drives and choose the Phillips L1210 drive for some specific reasons:
1. It was readily available
2. It had a history in the market of long-term reliability.
3. Easily serviced
4. It was a dedicated CD drive with proper clocking frequencies
5. The drive is not anywhere near as important as the DAC, the dedicated digital/analog Power Supply, and the Discrete Class A Output stage
6. When running it was ‘dead quite’
The last one is important because once the CD is lifted from the tray to rotate below the laser the construction and materials that make up the tray are irrelevant.
Given the choices we made the selection in favor of the best Redbook performance available.
James
