Wednesday, March 1, 2017

Mission PCM 4000

This brings backs memories ...
Pix from HiFiEngine

Mission produced an extremely good and sweet sounding CD player in the form of the PCM4000 in the late 1980's.

Both the PCM4K and PCM7K deployed the infamous Philips TDA1541A DAC chipset along with the Philips CDM2 transport, and the Philips RC5 IR remote facility. These CD players ran quite warm, even with the enlarge heatsinks vs their Philips equivalents. As per their Philips equivalents, the units were largely made of plastic.

I had truly very fond memories of the PCM4K as it always sounded "just right". And the larger display was a nice touch as you could view the displayed information from afar. 

Unfortunately the CDM2 deployed on the Misson PCM4K and PCM7K seem to be it's Achilles heel. For some unknown reason, my PCM4K and PCM7K did not enjoy service longitivity??? I bought a used PCM7000 after the CDM2 on the PCM4000 gave way. A few months later the CDM2 on the PCM7000 gave up as well! These back-to-back Mission CDP failure(s) really put me off Mission CD players ever since. The CDM2/10 on the Philips CD650 seem to be still going strong.