I don’t understand you, with the last Denon DJ CD-Players there was no big difference between CD’s and mp3 files, the players could both, i don’t only “listen” to CD’s, i scratch them and do the same things as with files, and with denon players it was always possible and no problem. I always used denon players, never pioneer players, because denon produced always the best CD-players for DJ’s, why not in future ? Denon has the know how for this ! If you only use the players with files, it’s ok for me, i used for over 10 years players which could both and still want to use both posibilities in future. When i listen to music i use vinyls, CD’s, mp3 / flac files at the same time and it’s really fun to have all possibilities 
Because you can only cling to outdated technology so long before being forced to move on. That’s why new cars no longer have cassette decks in them. That’s why nothing has had an eight-track player in decades. I wouldn’t want to be paying the extra cost of making these backwards compatible to CDs any more than I’d want to see them backwards compatible to eight-tracks.
Whether you still have a use for them or not isn’t the issue. CDs are on the way out. Long gone in many circles. Denon, while doing a complete overhaul of their media player line, made the choice that now was the time to pull the trigger and drop the old tech. If that’s a deal breaker for you, that’s fair, and so be it. You’ll have to look for other options. But be warned, those options will be drying up soon enough too. You’ll have to be like my friend who stocked piled VCRs so that he can continue to watch his movie collection for years to come.
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CD’s are dead, move on.
If your unable to move on, then buy a CD player.
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There are two reasons for leaving out of the 5000 (apart from the obvious “outdated technology”).
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It costs money (design, production, parts) to put something in that the vast majority of DJs don’t use anymore (it’s also why Pioneer launched the XDJ series)
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It takes (a relative lot of) space inside the unit. Trust me that with a full PC built into the 5000s, both space and cooling capacity (requiring some form of air flow) are at an extreme premium. Putting in a CD mechanism will take up too much space and disrupt the air flow.
When polled about wanting CDs or more powerful players, my guess is there would be a 90%+ majority that will gladly give up CD capability for more power.
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We have a great product with the SC5000 and it was natual progression in technology to leave the CD drive out, to make way for all the great features.
There had to be a compromise and it was worth it.
As I have suggested before, Denon may add support to connect an external optical drive. Would be great to keep all options open.
But this will only happen if there is enough demand, for now start getting those CD’s transfered to hard drive and then you will see the benefits.
I did this 16 years ago and never looked back.
Don’t get me wrong, I still get people giving me CD’s to play and I have a player for that.
If there are enough DJ’s out there, get the request into Denon. But remember you will not get all the amazing features the SC5000 has to offer, due to the limitations of CD optical media.
Would be like using an old school Denon S1000 and DN4500. I used both and were great at the time.
Let’s embrace the new technolgy and enjoy the future of being creative DJ’s 
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Sorry fella… as I recall, DJ Olde snagged my last one… however, if I ever find one (by chance, lol) lying around… it’s yours
I can understand all your arguments, but now you now, there are still some people out there who still DJ with CD’s 
… and for them the CD option is still very important at a DJ multi-player.
And if Denon would mange to offer a CD Option i would buy this option and would spend more money for this.
Yes, of course, maybe the CD will really die one time, but now in 2017 CD’s are not really dead, in 2016 CD’s are still more sold than MP3 files and vinyls. Only streaming of files was much higher (source: http://www.ifpi.org/facts-and-stats.php).
Pherhaps the reason is that i’m from germany … (in germany and japan the selling rate of physical media is still very high)
Depending on what the underling OS, plug in USB drivers would be easy to add, or pull in. I don’t think it would be a used feature though.
Ooooooh there’s so many levels to this:
Let’s draw some lines in some sand…
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I want to get any make, any model of external cd drive and plug its USB plug into one of the back USB ports on the SC5000
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I then want to put an audio CD in, select a track eg Track number 12, press play and have it play track 12 from the beginning of the track to the end of the track - @ 0.00 pitch
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I’d like to cue where the track starts
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I’d like to vary the pitch to make the track faster/slower
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I’d like to scratch/ perform turntablist tricks with the CD tracks
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I’d like to load different tracks from the CD into the two layers of the decj the cd drive is connected to - and mix those tracks
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I’d like the tracks on theCD player to be seen by and be loadable to any networked SC5000s not just the deck it’s connected to the USB port of. So with 4 xSC5000 I could load 8 cd tracks
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I want all the loping, rolling, slicing and hot cue functionality applied to the CD.
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I’d like to use the external cd drive to rip tunes from CD to a memory stick/thumb drive.
Any levels I’ve missed ?
Upto which number above would people want to go?
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Cant we have all the options. 
Which would no doubt require a specially designed unit from Denon. If I had to choose I’d pick 6, 7, 9.
Up to level 5 would be practical, maybe Cue points and Loops at a push.
But that would be the limit.
This is how most Denon CD decks worked in the past, such as DN2000, DN4500.
Keep it simple, less to go wrong.
This is a good compromise with what’s available.
I would be more than happy with this ️
As I said in an earlier post, let’s embrace the newer technology and be creative.
Seeing how the SC5000 does all those things with tracks it loads into internal memory (as witnessed by the option of pulling out the USB stick while playing and being able to continue doing everything with the track), that leaves only 2 points to consider:
- This can be limited to a “supported hardware” option where Denon decides what hardware will and what will not work. Another option obviously buying an OEM drive unit and Denon-labelling it.
- Being able to scroll through tracks and loading appropriate track.
All other points, as said, can be handled when the CD-track has been loaded into the internal memory as a WAV file.
I would choose 3+4+5+7+8. If it would be possible to use a backup CD (if the USB Stick died) to Play 4 Tracks on 2 Player or in Minimum 2 Tracks on one Player, than you are on the save side! This would be also a good Solution for the remaining CD DJs outside, so they can play their CDs also on the SC5000.
I would like level 1) - 8)
If the track is internal loaded / buffered to the SC5000, it would be not much difference, if the track is loaded from usb or CD (with higher speed as playing) to use all SC5000 functions, the analyzing of the file would be on the fly as in DN-SC3900.
Level 9) would be not necessary for me
S5000 had a cd player with two lenses to make one cd player work like two decks so its not like denon hasnt made anything before that would go great with the new unit, but would be nice if can simply plug in any external usb cd player on to one of the cd drives That would be a great selling point
The S5000 was a very clever single lense 16x speed DVD drive - used as a CD deck. It used buffers and the 16 x speed reading to store 40 seconds of track in just 5 seconds (access time took some of the seconds up). It then had 35 seconds to go off and read 40 seconds of the other track … very clever.
If CDs were as popular now, as they were circa year 2000, then I suspect that there would be dual layer/alpha track on the S5000.
Yes, the S5000 and other Denon players used a DVD Rom drive with a large buffer. Which most standard optical drives have these days.
You could even use a USB Blueray drive providing 12GB of storage for larger capacity. I digress…
This would mean depending on the SC5000 internal memory buffer size, pionts 1 - 8 above might be possible.
What is the internal buffer memory size of the SC5000 ? Would love to know the file size limit.
Bearing in mind the 2 layers probably share that resource.
A standard CD, 5 minute WAV format file at 44.1KHz/16 bit is around 50MB in size.
If the memory is large enough, then most, if not all of the great playbeck features of the SC5000 from USB could be possible with CD.
However, storage of cue points and beat grids etc would have to be stored to USB for recall when the CD is loaded again.
Think Pioneer does somthing like this with the 2K NXS 2 Correct me if I am wrong ?
Again, this is down to weather demand would be high enough and Denon could easily add the functionality in Firmware.
No doubt this debate will carry on, as said before a nice to have, but we will have wait and see
Let’s get the Primes out there first…nudge nudge
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Preach Brother, Preach. Pioneer DJ is the only manufacture that support cds on there decks. So now it’s time to do your homework and compare before you purchase. If you need cd drives in your setup. You have two option. One, spend the extra money to support your need and go pioneer. Two, bypass the mc5000 and wait for denon to release another model like the mc5000, that has the cd drive built in.