OK. Some very quick and unscientifically arrived upon numbers.
Lag time to:
Open tray................................9 sec
Load CD..................................9 sec (after opening tray)
Load DVD................................11 sec(" ")
Change songs while in shuffle.....10 sec
On a side note; One of the things I found surprising, and this may be coincidence, is while in shuffle mode the Yamaha takes songs off of the discs in order. What I mean is after playing a song off of disc 1 it picks one from disc 2, then disc 3. And so on.
For me, in reality, these drawbacks are not a big deal.
One thing I should clarify: I did for a short time own an Onkyo DVCP802. It was an refurb which in itself brought problems, but the shuffle mode on that, while faster, was terrible. It played a small portion of the songs while in shuffle mode then stopped.
I certainly don't want to talk you into the Sony, as I feel that it is an inferior product, but the rumors about the sluggishness of the Yamahas are well founded and may not be ideal if shuffle mode is a priority.
As far as who makes a better multi-player....... No clue here.