By your own admission you are comparing apples with pears. It would have been fairer to connect both the CD Player and the Empeg to the amp using RCA cables? I mean it's obvious that digital out is far superior to anologue, as long as the AMPS DAC is good. But then so is only ever plugging phono equipment into the phono stage of an amplifier.

Reminds me of my friend who somehow managed to mix up the speaker wires with the mains power wires into his expensive NAD amplifier. Guess what happened next?