Sony CDPCX355 300-Disc MegaStorage CD Changer

outstanding unit for people who have large number of CD's. It keeps your CD's safe and cleen.

I've had this player for over five years without a problem but looking at the reviews it appears to be hit or miss although people tend to more outgoing when they have a complaint. My point is any problem with this changer doesn't seem to be inherent in all of them because mine has played cds and cdrs that I have burned myself for many years. The changer doesn't like to play some cdrs in obviously bad shape so I have had to re-record some that I loaded when I first got this unit. My only real gripe is the memory can't hold all the cd's text that have text encoded on them so when scanning through you may find some rotating blank cd's and if you try to name the cd yourself and the changer reads that it's a text cd it won't let you name it using the changers own text memory. But the changer has plenty of memory to name your own discs using the changer just not to remember a lot of cd encoded text for some reason, but I use a lot of cd encoded text, more than three quarters loaded in the changer are cd encoded text so you may not have a problem with that at all. I see some people complaining about the sound of this thing but I think it sounds very good , especially for the price. I have had many components come through my system and this is not bad sounding at all. I currently use a bel canto dac2 in the basement and a benchmark dac1 in the living room, both hooked up to very good clear transparent systems and I switch the living room dac from the rega planet cd player to the optical coming from the changer when I just want background rotating music but I have listened to the audio outs of the changer and they don't sound bad at all. Relatively clear and detailed for the price. If the changer ever died I would definitely get another one at least until I can find a good music server for a decent price that's not my fan noisy computer. Just one more thing, when I moved I had this sony off and boxed for about a week and it retained all the cd titles I programed into it.

I am very pleased with the CD Changer I bought for my husband. I had looked for years in the stores and could never find one. It shipped quickly and was delivered in plenty time for Christmas. I will definitely order thru Amazon again and would encourage others to do the same.

This 300 disc CD changer works great. Easy to use and sounds great. And the price is right.

I've owned this machine for 3 years and it has now sat in the box for the last two. I have only three complaints:

1. Loading CD is cumbersome into the correct slot
Possible answer is to create a thin 'slide' like extension that can be anchored to the opening and provides a ramp into the slot. I should swing away into discrete depressions in the top.

2. Labeling is a pain
Not sure how to improve this. But there must be a more automated way like using wireless access to identify songs like on my media center server.

3. It won't play some personal burnt CD with my play-lists.
I've tried different type of Cd's and it's hit or miss.

4. It scratches the CD it plays
Intolerable.

My final solution was to create a Jukebox of my own with desktop computer and ripping music directly to it. This solves all four of my issues so I will not be looking for another hardware solution again.

I bought this to replace a single disc unit that had died. Frankly, I was looking for a player with about 100 disk capacity as I do not have many CDs. Since there are not any on the market, I decided to go with the Sony 300 disk player, giving me the capacity to add to my collection.
set up was clear, simple and easy. Instructions, while poorly written, were easy to follow and I was up and running in no time. Loading was relatively easy as was naming the disks-no real need for a keyboard-spinning the dial to enter letters,etc. was quite fast. The only issue I have with labeling is that there is a lack of sufficient space to add some complete titles but with clever abbreviations, it works. Do not like fact that once playing the disk title is not displayed but maybe I've missed something I need to do to make that happen. Also not sure that I can label each song playing but may not want to do that anyway. Searching is fairly fast and easy too.
I have not tried all features as yet but really like this machine and recommend it to anyone who wants to store their music, create play-groups, etc. Sound is excellent and searching is fairly fast. Good buy for the money.

This Sony is a great player with high capacity. Why store your 300 CDs when they will fit into the player for playing at will.

The software allows you to sort your music by any number of your chosen ways, no matter where in the carousel a CD is located. We love the other features like random play. This feature plays songs randomly and you never know what the next tune will be.

The remote works well and allows couch access to all the controls that are on the front of the unit.

And the Sony was a bargain in my opinion.

I read the other reviews and decided to try it anyway. The reviews are correct. The Changer fails to forward to the next CD. The changer skips the first few bars of a song or reepeats them like a stuck record and every now and then it just won't play at all. I tried to return it but it was past the 14 days and the vendor said no. Very intermittent piece of equipment. Not much better than 8-tracks.

I had one of these before and broke it. I love them. It plays all my cds, including ones I copied on my computer. I guess it would be just as easy to have an ipod that holds 3000 songs, but I'm a music lover and all my favorites are already on cd. I put it on random and it plays all my music, all day -- my own life's soundtrack. Just don't move it with cds in there -- that's how my first one got broken!

After sending the first unit back because it would not recognize any discs, the second unit has played flawlessly for seven months. I guess you either get a good one or a bad one. Just be sure you can return it on their dime if something is wrong. I believe this changer is well worth what you pay for it!

We've had our player for about a year and it has made the trip to the service center in Laredo 3 times and we've had enough. It hunts for discs endlessly and can never change discs for more than a few times before it screws up and does the carousel dance. Laredo 'adjusted' it a couple of times and on the third trip 'couldn't find anything wrong'. When we got it back after the last trip it was just as bad as before. It's going in the trash and our house will now be a Sony-free zone forever.

after a few months . . . my review is: Got a bargain, and its great . . . a very very pleasant surprise, even for Sony . . .but, I noticed that the words junk, garbage, and disappointment were suggested for tags, meaning that others were disappointed, so we'll see over the long run . . . read other reviews .. . I am pleasantly surprised though . . .

We have enjoyed this product more than one month and we are very happy we made a right choice. It's wonderful.

Sony CDPCX355 300-Disc MegaStorage CD Changer

Stay away from this one. Unit worked until after the 30 day Amazon return policy and then started skipping or not loading cd's. The cd's would play fine in other players. Contacted Sony and sent it to their replacement center. They have a great policy for warranties. You spend your money and buy a "new" product. They replace it with a "refurbished" product. After you pay the shipping to them. And the refurbished product has the same issues as the original. When you purchase a cd changer you at least expect it to play cd's, especially brand new cd's. Sony Customer support recommendations are first to clean the cd's and second to unplug the unit and reset it. Neither one will fix anything. I am convinced from after the fact research this model has a serious design problem yet Sony just looks the other way. I now appear to be stuck with a hit and miss cd changer. It will not load or play a brand new cd but will load and play one that was on the floor of my truck getting stepped on for 6 months.
6/1/09 - After sending this unit back to Sony and paying the shipping I still have the same problems. I just purchased a Yamaha 5 disc carousel and I am not even shocked that the same exact cd's that will not load or play when they do load in the Sony, play just fine in the Yamaha. Imagine that. I will never buy anything Sony even if they were the last manufacturer on the planet. I will now try to get what I can for it at a pawn shop.

The product appears to be what we were searching for; however, we have yet to use it. Thus I can't really rate it.Sony CDPCX355 300-Disc MegaStorage CD Changer

I purchased this CD Changer and then returned it after a few weeks. The CD Changer would routinely skip the first track of every CD I played. It would skip no matter how new or old the CDs were. Cleaning the CD's did not help, nor did using a CD head cleaner. There are numerous reports of this issue on the web.

Save your money.

Have had this unit about a month and it is working just fine.I haven't taken advantage of it's many features yet-I just put it on random and let it play. I will catagorize them soon and put a corresponding number on the case the cd came in that matches the slot they're in. I have a cabinet for the cases which have a lot more info than you can input into the machine. As others have said this unit is deep and I too had to cut out the back of part of the cabinet for it to fit. Use the optical output if your receiver has an input for this-it was a noticable difference in audio quality. Make sure it's level-first thing I did and no skipping on any cd I played. Set up properly this unit should give years of enjoyment.

I own 2 , Had both for 3 years never had a problem. 1 changer is full the other has 169 in it

This Sony CDPCX355 300-Disc MegaStorage CD Changer is fantastic. Would recommend to anyone looking for a 300-Disc CD Changer.

I have always preferred to buy Sony products over the years until purchasing this CD player...now I am going to steer away from. Our experience has been very negative: it does not read the first couple of songs on some Cds, it has eaten some Cds and it has been very difficult to extract the damaged Cds, it skips some Cds, very irritating and aggravating experience. I have a strong urge to smash the unit! Instead I have given up on the poor quality and will buy another Cd player from a better company. This Cd player lasted 5 months until I have had it. Very disappointing experience.

I've had my CX-355 for five years now, use it almost every day, and have never had a problem with it--so I don't understand people having CD's ruined. It's completely filled, except sometimes for disc slot #1.

I fill it with CD copies so if someone was to steal it I wouldn't be out 300 times $15. And I have all the disk names down on paper (using MS Word) both by group and by slot # so I can quickly find or identify disks.

Initially I didn't think I needed 8 separate groups, but now I wish I had more.

Hope they keep making this or one like it, because when mine eventually breaks, I definitely want to replace it with something like it.

I bought my first CD player in the late 80's. It was a Pioneer 6-disc changer. Last month, it died. As I was shopping for it's replacement, I found this Sony 300-disc changer for a little over $200 and was thrilled. I have a large CD collection and thought this would be a great way to store some of them and listen to them as well.

I must say, I bought this device before I read the reviews online, so I had nothing but optimism for it. Some high points first. It was very easy to use and operate. Loading CDs was a snap, and while the unit allows you to plug in a keyboard, using the knobs to toggle through the alphabet and characters was easy. In a few minutes after plugging it all in to my stereo, I had all of my Bowie and Beatles discs loaded and labeled. I even created a special group (you can create up to 8) of just Bowie discs. Again, very easy. The shuffle does have a bit of a delay between songs, but I liked that for some reason. It was more like a real jukebox rather than streaming digital noise. The pause felt like a cleansing of the palate before the next serving.

The first sign of trouble was when I put in disc 2 of Bowie at the Beeb. This is a disc I have never listened to, yet the device could not read it. I was cleaning the disc, looking at it in bright light trying to figure out what was wrong. Oh well, I put it back in its case and moved on.

Having filled about a third of the device, I had come across 7 discs that it would not play. It seemed to have trouble reading the first track only. The device had also skipped frequently and twice, a disc has fallen off the carosel and gotten lodged in the back of the machine. In one case, it scratched the disc. This did not affect the playing of the disc.

With all of this trouble, I read the Amazon reviews and saw many people reporting identical problems. I honestly refused to believe the negative comments because I liked this device so much. After more loading and more problems, I'm packing it up tonight and returning it.

I looked at the Pioneer multi-disc changer, and while it seems to function better, the fact that you cannot electrinically label the discs (you have to keep a computer print-out of the discs and their slot in the unit). This is a deal-breaker as well. Sony seems to have the form, while Pioneer nailed the function. Too bad they couldn't get together.

I'm sure you are reading this and thinking, "this unit I bought will be different". I hope it is. Otherwise, you'll be like me sitting here writing a review and putting off the task of having to put all of these discs back into binder after binder. What a disappointment!

I have a 400-disc changer we've had for several years - no problems at all! Someone gave us another unit that skipped like crazy; then I read V.Hoang's review and tip about putting something heavy on top - it works like a charm! Thanks again - I love the Internet!

So... I'm curious. Why does this 300 disc changer look like a faggot in a yellow shirt?

I bought the Sony CX355 300 CD jukebox a little over 2 years ago from amazon. It looked like a great item and the price was right, along with the free shipping. I loaded about 90 CD's in it and it was great, everything worked fine and I had all 3 programs input & running fine. However, out of the blue, a few days ago, it started skipping bad, and would not play any programs, etc. Until then, it was perfect. So, I guess I am luckier than others here as I got 2 years out of mine, however, I would have thought it would have lasted longer. After reading all the reviews and horror stories about trying to get repairs, etc, I am just going to throw mine at the county dump. Luckily, I kept my old CD player, a 6 changer Onkyo that has worked fine for almost 10 years, and will start using this again. No more Sony products for me.

This unit preformes excently, however I recomend that you create your inventory with a computor listing so that it can be printed out. Earl

I can't belief that a cd player from such a reputable company as SONY can give somuch trouble. I bought one a year ago and two days after the warranty expired the cd stop playing. Seems that the motor mechanism was weak and it would cost as much as a new one, so i bought a new one instead from J& R thru Amazon and right out the box, it would play a cd and upon starting the second cd it would stop playing the cd at 1 second or 2 second and i would hear a clicking sound in the player. I try and see if i can' t get back my money from J&R and go for a diferent brand.

I didn't know that the CD player did not have it's own built in amplifier. No mention of this fact in the description. It also needs seperate speakers, not mentioned either. Had an old CD player that had both things. Using this one, plugged into the old one. No one seems to know what amplifier I need. My old speakers work with it.

Just a little ticked off.

Info on an amplifier would be appreciated.

We are loving the CD storage/changer!!! Since we're not "IPod people", this is a perfect solution for us. We never listened to our CD's - it was always too much trouble to look through them, etc. Now, they are all neatly stored and just a click away from enjoying them.

This CD player has never worked well. The laser unit malfunctions all of the time. The unit regularly cannot read the first several tracks of a disc. Stay away from this one. Look for other options.

We purchased this player (with extended warranty) from a large box retailer and enjoyed it for 5 months before disaster struck. It "ate" one of our favorite CD's. We did manage to get it out, but then it skipped repeatedly, and like the other reviews have stated, it played the first few seconds over and over again on the first track of each CD. We brought it in for repair, they said it would take about 7 days. On the 7th day, they stated it had been sent to a Sony repair location, and would probably be there for 2 to 3 days. After waiting that amount of time, we found it had been sent to another repair facility where Sony had more "parts". All in all, it took almost 30 days to have it returned. MUCH to our surprise, it wasn't ours, but a reconditioned machine. After much frustration, and MANY conversions with the store managers, we were given a new machine...same model. We have had it for 4 months now, and have it sitting on a extended piece of glass as to keep it as level as possible (being that it will not fit on standard shelving because of it's depth.) We choose not use random play at all and as far as programing it........we have decided that we will just let it play it's heart out one disc at a time, until it dies. We will not buy another Sony CD player again.....even with extended warranty.

Bumped into these reviews regarding the Sony..not the 1st time is had heard same complaints. My exstensively old blues collection out grew my 200 cd changer awhile ago, only so many my pc will hold before it becomes a snail, , Sony walkman (dig), storage all good but want the CD's safe and be able to find a Cd without going thru towers.. anyhow.. not many to choose from and my idea was with so many complaints there must have been many returns to fix the problem (hopefully) so I purchased a refurb from ebay a little over 100 buxs. No bad news to report.. (so far) I am surprised that the sound quality from this is noticably better the the 200 changer which was very good. I began with Sony's earliest cartridge changer... geeesh but I managed. This is the obvious, keep this humongous beast level, my 200 changer had a few mishaps, more then a few, but alls well that ends well. My heart goes out to those who had there precious cd's injured maybe I'm lucky with the refurb or maybe its something for the prospective buyer to think about. Also, i don't lop side the load when I am going thru the arguous task of going thru the cd,s and naming them, mine is filled to the limit, weight equally distributed.. I would think Sony would be more careful with allowing there name to be connected to a CD eater, getting off the subject... My son has an Ipod... I didn't feel like putting out the bux for one so i picked up a Sony Walkman that works perfectly with my Windows Media 11 (pc).. The sound is to my ears so much more real with imagery etc.. my model $80! only 2 gigs but its about the tunes not the video for me.
These reviews are scarey for the person looking for a big Juke box.. think refurbish or make sure you have ample time to return a new one..but if your "blessed" with one which functions as it should.. Its a good sounding piece of gear with big storage, just be sure you have the space for it and keep it level...

I've had this product for only a few months, it reminds me of the old style record machines that you would find in clubs, bars, etc.,Only more technally advanced. There is only one minor problem with it, and that is in it's search for songs in the random play mode it's a little slow, but this could be due to it having to search through 300 cds, but then i also thought like this with every cd being labeled it should not be a problem to find a song. I watched the old style jukebox machines and how they would search for records, and play the song requested, and they were really fast at finding the song/songs, and since this machine seems to work on that same principle it stands to reason that it should be just as fast if not faster due to mordern electronic technology of today,i would watch the old style jukebox machines search for records, and the one thing that i noticed was the carousel would really spin fast in it's search for songs it didn't take very long at all for it to find a song, and since this product seems to be made on this same principile then the electronic wizards at sony should be able to incorporate this into their MegaStorage Units. Go back to the drawing table guys i believe that you all can improve on the MegaStorage's random search song ability shave some of it's song finding time down/off i mean come on the old style juke boxes were faster i'm sitting there looking at the front display screen, and all i see is this disc twirling around, and around, and around, and around, you get my drift? until it finally finds the song i think the operative word here is "CAROUSEL SPEED"

I've had this player for about a year now and it has never given me any trouble. What I like most about it is that you can make copies of music CD's on your computer with text so you don't have to hand make a spreadsheet. The text you type in or in my case is somehow automatically brought in on the computer appears in the display so you can see the name of the album, the performer and the names of the songs. The song names appear and stay visible througout the entire song so you know what you are listening to at all times. When you are not actually playing a song the name of the album appears in the display. I use Roxio CD creator on my computer to do all this. Another thing I like about this player is that you can group CD's anyway you want to so all you have to do is punch up the group number (1-8) and you then can listen to just those CD's without having to go through the rest while searching for the CD you want to listen to. You simply give the group number a name and file the disc in that group. My overall experience with this player has been great. Fot those who have had problems my guess is that you were the victim of a defective Sony product purchase. From reading a lot of reviews on Sony products, I've come to the conclusion that Sony makes good products but some of them make it to the shelves with defects. I've been fortunate that all the Sony products I've purchased were in perfect shape. If I am right about this, Sony had better do something or it is really going to hurt their business as more and more people wise up to what is going on. My advice is to be aware of this when you are making a decision on whether or not to purchase a Sony product and make sure you get all the information you can about returning the product if it indeed proves to be defective otherwise you might get stuck with it. Sony's customer service is really poor so I wouldn't even bother with contacting them if you have a problem. Deal with the store from where you purchased it. Make sure you understand their return policies before making a purchase. That goes with anything not just Sony products. Anyways thats my take on it. This player is a good player only if it is not defective.

I finally had to replace my old Sony CD changer after five years of problem-free use at my shop. We sell CDs and play them continually - nine hours a day, seven days a week. It finally started stuttering and cleaning didn't cure it. I bought another Sony. Couldn't ask for much more.

the product works fine it is slow in it's functions. But it works. What I am unhappy with is the service I got from Amazon customer service. I got this 400 disc player and no instructions, no remote, no hookup cables nothing but the beat up box and the machine. Their responce was "return it" I asked them to help me get the missing items they quit responding. Customer service in action. NO HELP The machine was to be a gift I explained this and that I did not have time to return it and get another one especialy since they were going to charge me to return it. {shipping} Thank You Signed NO HELP AT ALL FROM CUSTOMER SERVICE

This product is so easy to use, plus I love that I can get rid of all the cd cases, no more clutter because everything is stored in the player which frees up a lot of space, no more dust or fingerprints on the cd's!!

I have had this CD changer for many years. Except for a few minor irritants at the beginning I have been satisfied with it. But a few days ago it died! When I say died I mean in the grave, absence of vital signs, Nada, zip, nothing, crapped out, zero, down the S$%*&er! I am not going to replace irt with same device. I'll try something different.

Fast shipping; product as described. Easy to set up and even easier to use. Very intuitive operation.

Unless you find yourself running out of space on your current player you'll have a hard time filling this one up. Works and sounds great with my equipment.

I just bought and installed the 300 disc MegaStorage CD changer. While the entering of all my discs into a spreadsheet or data base is a little daunting, the idea that I don't have to fish through a drawer, or stare at a tower is wonderful. The system works very well, is not too difficult to set up, and with the ability to set up categaries and favorites will make accessing my CDs easy. The only complaint I have is that I don't have any way of knowing what's on each track of each CD.

An amazing piece of technology, and it costs less than $200!

This was the most useless piece of junk I have purchased in a long while. When it was brand new it would not play the first song on about one third of my CDs. I spent something to the tune of $40 to ship it back to Sony for repair. Once returned it was better (it would play about 9 out of 10 CDs properly but still was not right. Now (about 1 year later) it plays the beginning of the first song on each CD several times before it continues to play the entire song. I give up. I bought an iPod and am currently loading all my music into it. Once I get the Sony player empty I shall be taking the sludge hammer to it....

This is the second Sony 300-disc changer that I have purchased. My first, an identical unit, was purchased about five years ago. As a few of the other reviewers have noted, this unit seems prone to failure. I would have expected it to last longer that it did particularly since it was not used all that frequently over the five years. In my case the failure was not with the changer mechanism (as I probably would haven expected) but with either the disc drive or laser. Had I not been constrained by size limitations, I probably would have purchased the comparable Pioneer unit as its customer reviews were generally more favorable. But on the positive side, I paid well over $100 less for this unit than I did my original one. So if this one lasts five years or more I will have to say I got my money's worth. And the unit does function smoothly and quietly. As far as sound, it does what I would expect any decent player to do, that is, accurately read and pass on whatever is on the disc.

I previously had the exact same unit and have been happy with it for years. It is very convenient to have 300 CDs at your fingertips, with all the features of grouping sets of CDs, etc.

I ordered a new unit through Amazon. I proceeded to put over 100 CDs into their slots and attached a keyboard and entered titles (short text space is one of the few complaints I have about this model). I then began playing some music. Everything was as expected until I came to a group of CDs that would not play. I switched a few to troubleshoot and determined that those slots were bad. The CDs are fine in different slots and other CDs wouldn't play in those slots.

So I wrote to Amazon and suggested that they give me a partial refund. It would be inconvient for them and for me to deal with returning this unit that has already taken 2+ hours of my time to set up. Everything about this CD changer is very good except a few CD slots are defective.

Amazon has yet to respond to my email after 1 week. I am not happy with Amazon's lack of response. I plan to update this review if/when they respond.

Update: For the past 10 days, I have been sending in emails and questions/comments through Amazon's online system and have been given minimal feedback from them and no offer for compensation or negotiation to keep me as a customer. I have asked 4 times for a call to discuss this matter and have yet to receive one. I called them today and their system of customer records was down so they could not help. My opinion of Amazon's service level is rapidly declining... Oh, I also determined that an additional 5+ CD slots do not work on this unit and I returned it. But I do not know if I am scheduled to get a refund, replacement or what... No response from Amazon customer service.

Bottom line: Be prepared to return items from Amazon if they are not as you had expected.

all features performed ok. It takes a lot of time to enter digital titles for each CD. Maybe one day CDs will contain a digital title that can be read by these machines.
I especially liked the manual controls for replaying a song .The remote works well too

Putting the CDs in and taking them out is somewhat awkward. Also I've run into one CD that the multi CD player won't play.

So cool to have alllll my CD's in one convenient place and not deal with the cases and putting them away, etc. I generally use the all disc shuttle option which means I can have opera followed by a Randy Travis track...I just never know..I wish Sony had allowed CD's to be assigned to more than one category tho...so much music is cross-over, I'd like Zero & to both Easy Listening and New Age. There is a depay in going form track to track but it's not horrible and I got used to it. I recently linked a second 300CD Sony to the first but I haven't seen the shuttle fuction will cross over to the second unit and the manual is a bit unclear as are the Sony reps I spoke with. I've had my first unit for about 2 years with no problems.

I purchased this item from Amazon after my previous one (same exact model) came down with a case of the cronic skips. Bought the original one at Tweeter 4 years ago and never had any issues until the skipping, which apparently is not fixable. Even those special CD lens cleaners could not really fix it, although did make it skip less for a while. Sony offers no advice on this issue except what not to do or send it in and get a refurb (which costs almost as much as a new unit).

However, I like the megastorage concept, I never had any issues with the unit, the price is a bargin, and there are not many different options in this category. My first unit from Amazon immediately snapped 3 of my CDs in half (including a very expensive Budda Bar CD) due to some mechanical issue with moving CDs from the player back into the cart. Amazon replaced it within 2 days of contacting them for a replacement. New one works perfectly and most importantly my wife is happy once again.

This is the 2nd one of these we purchased in the last 18 months. This one began to skip after 2 weeks. The first one worked for over a year

Great product for storing and playing the entire CD collection - and the price just keeps coming down