You should also listen to the Meridian 808. We recently did compare this player with the Esoteric X-O1. We all three ( including the owner of the X-O1 found the Meridian superior than the X-O1. When you compare redbook cd, the Meridian is by far superior. More weight in the low freq, more detail, more depth, a far better individual focus and a more analog sound. When we did some testing with sacd compared to cd, we agreed that this player is a lot better with sacd compared to cd. But when we compared the Esoteric with sacd to the cd layer on the Meridian we still prefered the sound of the Meridian. The low freq. played at sacd is awesome, no doubt about it. But the individual focus was a lot better with the Meridian. Also we liked more the timbre of voices and instruments.
