The waiting is finally over, ATC has launched not one but two new components both of which sport CD drives, the world surely moves in mysterious ways down near Stroud. The £2,153 CDA2 is a CD player, DAC and preamp in one full width case. It is controversial for both including the ability to play a format on the wane and the absence of a USB input, but as ever with ATC build quality is first rate and it has both balanced and single ended outputs. It runs a 24/192 Wolfson DAC and has both analogue (2) and digital (4) inputs alongside a headphone output, on the back panel. The aluminium front panel matches existing ATC electronics and is 13mm thick.
The SIACD is a bit more of a departure as it squeezes an integrated amplifier, CD player and DAC into a 315mm (12.4inch) chassis. ATC has realised that people want fewer boxes in the living room and this 100 watt/channel all-in-one supplies that desire, the question is will they want to shell out the £2,975 asking price? Here the headphone output is on the front panel and it also has an asynchronous USB input (which begs a question!) alongside another Wolfson DAC beneath a similarly lustrous half inch front panel available in black or silver. With a pair of ATC speakers it could just be the ultimate one box system.