I'm expecting to buy both a new TV and a DVD player soon. I currently
have a Philips cd changer which is at least ten years old. I'd like to
believe that a modern cd player will sound a lot more musical than the
Philips, and I'm wondering whether I can get that desired result by
replacing it with a dvd player. My budget will be fairly limited
(sub-$400, ideally well below that max), and the rest of the system is
modest--an NAD 713 receiver and a pair of PSB B25 speakers.

I'm thinking about NAD for the DVD player, but I have no first hand
experience with them, and I'm not clear whether their mid-level
(currently T534) player would be substantially better (in terms of
audio) than the entry-level T514. Likewise, are the latest models worth
the premium over the discontinued models? And are there other brands I
should be looking at? Any advice would be appreciated.

Many of the universal players available today are as good as a one
piece solution gets. Spending much over a thousand dollars is a total
waste. An outboard DAC can bbe beneficial, especially if it can drive a
power amp directly without the added unnecessary overhead of a preamp.

A better-executed version of the Njoe Tjoeb concept with a good
precision attenuator (yes, you can do volume control in the digital
domain, but few do it properly-an oops can blast you with full output
inadvertently with most designs) actuated manually, a stepper or both,
is the obvious thing no one wants to do.

Putting an attenuator on the power amp, making it in effect a line
stage integrated, also works-but not as well sometimes, and limits your
amp choices.