To be honest I would look out for a CD3300 on ebay, they do come along quite regularly (and well priced, normally less than £100) and I have yet to come across a non working one, they seem fairly bullet proof. The advantage of this is you'll be able to control it remotely using either a terminal 3300 or a beolink 1000.
Any other CD player will be fine though but you'll probably need a phono/RCA > 5 pin DIN adaptor lead. You can even connect an IPOD or your PC using the AUX input via a jack > 5 pin DIN lead if you wish.
Chris.
The use of metaphors should be avoided like the plague. They're like a red rag to a bull to me.