Cambridge Audio Azur 751BD

I have had a NAD multi-player Master Series for several years, and it sounded very good and picture quality was also very good. Unfortunately it could not play blu ray discs en the menu looked bad. Build quality, however, was superb. So I decided to look for a multi-player that could, besides, (SA)CD and DVD, also play blu ray discs with very good image and sound quality and with good build quality. I first tried the CA 650BD. Unfortunately, both sound and picture quality were not to my satisfaction and ik could not really understand the "excitement" about this model. Then I tried the 751BD. Sound and image quality improved a lot. Image quality was, in my opinion, as good as the NAD, whereas sound quality was very good, but the NAD sounded a little better. Build quality was also very good and the looks of the 751BD were OK. As a bonus I had a very good DAC, internet-connection (You Tube and Picasa) and a streaming device for my digital movies on the NAS. So far, I am very satisfied with the 751BD and hope to use it for many years to come!

Had mine 2 months now & very pleased , picture is superb now player run in & and ive had a tinker with settings .. love it

After much consideration I decided to go for the Azur 751BD player, I payed £699 ( £100 Off ) & got a free pair of Sony headphones worth £30 with a What Hifi Magazine voucher ........ From Richer Sounds .
So very happy with deal .
I have had it a week and so far I am very happy with Picture & Sound performance , The 2 HDMI outputs mean I can keep my current Pioneer SCLX 71 , although Im hoping to upgrade in new year..
Setting up was easy and I have found it very user friendly. Picture quality is awsome through my JVC X3 Projector and I can see a nice improvement from my old Pioneer LX08( of 4 years ) which is no slouch !
Viewing is crisper & motion is smoother ..
Sound has more detail & clarity..
Only negative is the remote , not being backlit , but is not a real issue as I have set it in my Logictech 1000 remote .
So if you are thinking of an upgrade The Cambridge BD 751 will not dissapoint.

CD AUDIO:

I auditioned the 751BD player for a week. I compared it to my Cambridge Azur 650C CD player (a cd player which I like very much) and the sound from the players was virtually indistinguishable. I used my Focal 816 V speakers, Kimber 4TC cables and PBJ interconnects, and Yamaha RXA-3010 (Pure Direct mode). If I remember correcntly, these two players actually use the same Wolfsen DACs (the 751BD just has more of them).

BLU-RAY:

I'm not a "videophile," but I do have a Samsung 50" Plasma (6000 series), and on it, the blu-ray picture didn't look any different from that of my PS3, or borrowed $100 LG player. I compared these three players for audio and video quality when playing blu-rays: titles like LOTR (Two Towers) and Invictus. You might find differences if you pause-spot-checked, but good luck otherwise—video looked identical to me. The real difference was in the audio quality. There's no doubt that the 751BD outperforms—by a decent margin—these other players in audio. I have cheapo surrounds (Realistic Minimus 7s), and the player made these come alive in a way I never thought possible. I was quite surprised.

Separately, this QDEO processor business sounds great, but I wasn't impressed; not when picture looked just as good on a player costing ten times less. I would've loved to have been blown away by the video processing, but CA has to get real: if a $100 LG player can make the picture look virtually as nice—what's all the buzz about, upscaling? Justification for the price tag is going to have to come from somewhere else—perhaps the combination of all the other features (SACD/DVD audio, streaming features etc.). Are all the other features enough to make it worth the price? Cambridge Audio made this answer harder than I thought it'd be.

question.  CA-CEO stated that AAC support was added...for Mac users...Does this mean that this player can stream iTunes or do the AAC files have to be exported from iTunes?  Anyone know the best way to use this player to stream from iTunes?  This would make it very interesting for a 100 million iTunes users...

Interested in how this machine compares with the 740C as a CD player? I love the 740C and have been planning to invest in a dedicated BD player to supplement my Panasonic PVR combo. Given this has the same DACs & upsampling, will this replace my CD player too?

"Switch to the player's HDMI output and the DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack of Michael Jackson's This Is It and the player hits you with meaty bass lines and drum kicks."

Is this a quality of the player or the disc being used? I mean, every Blu-ray player should be able to deliver the same 'meaty bass lines and drum kicks' when outputting DTS-HD MA over HDMI!

I allready have a (big model) PS3 that plays 2D and 3D blue rays and SACD discs over HDMI (except no DVD audio). It doesn't sound or look bad to me. I have to wonder if this 800£ Cambridge Audio "upgrade" would be well spent???

Well spotted Jacob.

Actually at the time of writing the manual, only WMA and MP3 support had been implemented, but with software driven products, we are sometimes able to (and actively strive to) add features such as increasing CODEC support over time. In the case of the 751BD, we were able to add AAC, FLAC and WAV playback support in an update just before the product shipped.

The 751BD can also be updated over the internet or via USB by customers if/when we issue further updates, which we certainly hope to....

Yes, it does play FLAC and WAV files. As for comparisons between this and the Oppo, all will be revealed in our August issue Group Test, on sale June 30th. 

As an owner for the past few weeks, I'd completely agree with the review. It has partnered very well with B&W CM8s and Cyrus, and it has added bass in a good way to my other components.

Picture quality (especially blu-ray) is superb - very little judder on fast-panning scenes and very sharp outlines to characters.

As an £800 machine though, the remote control is very poor. My example feels cheaper than the 650 version I owned before...some buttons even squeak when used. The lack of backlight is extremely difficult for us projector users. Are you listening Cambridge? 

Great review thanks. I’m curious though. Given that the CA751 is based on the same developer kit as the Oppo 93 and the two players are virtually identical apart from the analogue boards and dacs, I was surprised to see this review take the time to investigate and praise the upscaling/noise reduction and comparative picture quality through both HDMI ports on the CA751 when the review of the Oppo barely mentioned anything in this regard. Did the team detect a difference in the picture quality of the CA751 compared to the Oppo?

Also the CA751 manual states that only WMA and MP3 files can be played. Did the review establish that the 751 does actually playback FLAC and WAV files?