The new Philips Multichannel SACD/DVD player (SACD-1000) has 6 analog outputs for Multichannel. And I assume the new Multichannel Sony SACD players due out in April (SCD-C555ES) and May (SCD-CE775) will also have analog outputs.

On the DAC question, the Sony press release says both players will feature "a new Super Audio D/A converter system (SA DAC)."

The folks at dCS ( http://www.dcsltd.co.uk/News/ces2001.htm ) showed an SACD player at CES that had a 1394/Firewire output which they say will output both Stereo and Multichannel SACD in digital form. Their web site also suggests that the standard consumer digital SACD output will be 1394/Firewire.

Makes sense. Although I'm not sure where dCS got this info - as I haven't seen such an announcement from Sony/Philips to date. Unless dCS knows something we don't.

As for Meridian, at CES they talked about an SACD Input card for the 861 to be developed after the 598 DVD-A player ships. What wasn't clear from that mention was whether Meridian plans to keep the DSD signal in that format before conversion to analog (along the lines of dCS, Sony, Philips and Accuphase) or whether they plan to convert it to PCM before analog (as the Pioneer "universal" AX-10 player does.)

We'll have to "stay tuned" for details from Meridian there, I suppose.