CD/SACD-проигрыватели и транспорты — Shanling CT90

The CT90 is a CD transport from Shanling, a unit without its own DAC that reads discs and hands the data to an external converter over several digital links. It was announced in December 2025 at USD 899 internationally, while the American list price is USD 999, and its aluminium case follows the look of the SCD3.3 SACD player. It belongs to the compact 90 series, with black and silver finishes offered.

Key specs that matter

Disc reading relies on a DA11 drive under an SAA7824 servo, and pressed CDs, recordable CD-R, rewritable CD-RW and MQA-CD are all read, though SACD is not supported. For MQA discs three output modes can be chosen - Full Decoder at 4x, Core Decoder at 2x and a source mode. The I2S port on an HDMI socket carries PCM up to 32-bit/768 kHz and DSD512, and an FPGA gives it 10 selectable pin layouts. Two AES/EBU outputs plus a coaxial output handle PCM up to 32-bit/192 kHz and DSD64, while a USB audio output reaches 768 kHz and DSD512 without upsampling. The case measures 280 x 230 x 91 mm and weighs 3.5 kg.

Engineering and use context

A CT7302 chip does the upsampling and can turn any disc into high-rate PCM or DSD on the I2S, AES and coaxial outputs. Timing comes from separate 45 MHz and 49 MHz oscillators, and a clock input accepts an external master reference. Power is drawn from a linear supply built on a 35 W transformer. The drive loads from the top under a cover that tilts open, and a supplied puck holds the disc in place. A 4.8-inch panoramic screen shows track data and gives direct access to settings, and a remote comes in the box. Beyond discs, the CT90 takes a USB drive of up to 2 TB with FLAC, WAV, AIFF, APE and MQA files, browsed through the Eddict Player app for iOS and Android over SyncLink. A Bluetooth 5.0 receiver accepts LDAC, aptX HD, aptX, AAC and SBC streams.

Pairing

Because there is no conversion inside, the CT90 needs a DAC, a streamer with digital inputs or active speakers with AES/EBU connections. The dual AES outputs suit active speakers that take a digital feed per channel, and the I2S socket is the only path for native DSD from disc, so the receiving DAC must match one of the 10 pin layouts. The SM90 streamer from the same 90 series takes the coaxial feed, matches the case width and depth and does the conversion.

Alternatives

The Shanling ET3 is a smaller CD transport at 188 x 255 x 68 mm and 2.5 kg that adds Wi-Fi, DLNA and AirPlay to disc playback.