CD Player recommendation

[PastorD]

We are having a gospel artist sing at our church this upcoming weekend. As a small church, we had been using a plain ole cd player to play cd's when needed via line in to our Yamaha EMX 512 mixer. I have been told that the singer tracks may be mp3 cd's. I am worried our very basic cd player may not get the job done. Can someone recommend a cd player that could get the job done. Is standalone DJ Type players as the numark ndx400 a waste of money? Our budget is $200 for a cd player. I want something that we can use for a long time. Thanks.

[[Admin] osborn4]

Do you have a computer with an CD drive?

[PastorD]

Yes I have a laptop. How did I not consider this. Thanks.

[[Admin] osborn4]

I'd rip the tracks onto the laptop and fire them from there.

[Frank DeWitt]

We use a DJ type player and love it. Two reasons, OK 3. It starts instantly at the beginning of sound, not at the beginning of a track with 2 sec of silence. Get's rid of that LONG moment when you start the track for the soloist and she stands there. There is a cue button so you can run it to the right moment, hit Cue, and it will stop and restart at that moment. It has a count down timer so when there is a pause in the music 10 sec before the track is over I know not to stop.

Alll these are available on a laptop and I use a laptop for complicated shows with lots of tracks but for "I am singing this morning, here is my CD, it is track 4. It is quick and easy.

[Arlin]

We use these: http://tascam.com/product/cd-500/ over some of the DJ type players.
Main reason: only one rack space.
Also, it will do everything Frank said above.

It is a bit pricey, though (~$500).
There is also a balanced version for about $100 more, but in most cases, the balanced output is not worth it IMO.

[waynehoskins]

We have an older Numark deck. It works well, but statistically it gets used once a year for a Christmas party. At times it hasn't even been tied in to the performance system, just the assembly system. I've contemplated getting rid of it since it virtually never gets used, but it is a good lowest-common-denominator thing to have around. If we didn't have one, though, I'm not sure that I'd get one. CDs are quickly going the way of the cassette tape and the LP, replaced by iPods and the like.

For this specific application, I'd look to software first. For a universal "play something back" convenience feature, I'd buy an iPod cable.

My situation may be different from yours though. We never use backing tracks, and I haven't been at a church with choir, symphony, piano and organ in over twenty years, though I'm given to understand that all of those are still quite commonplace.

[PastorD]

Thank you for all the replies.