@twoleftears while I have no first hand experience with the TEAC / Esoteric transports, their reputation proceeds them. More than "very good", many have labeled them class leading. However, I will defer to @jafant and if he knows they're in-field performance has shown them less than exceptional, I believe him.
Incidentally, the Philips transports acted just about perfect in my experience. I **may** have encountered one defective unit in a Consonance CD120 Balanced, but I apologize, as that recollection could be incorrect. Otherwise, they have performed without issue for me.
Now...speaking of the Consonance CD120 Balanced, I no longer have any and didn't dig deep enough for pictures, so I cannot speak with absolute confidence in comparing the internal layout. But this Hegel Mohican gives me a strange sense of deja vu. Outside of the digital out connector and an extra line of printing where they included the Hegel name, the rear of the two machines look identical.
I wanted to simplify and streamline what I felt seemed like an overly broad and confusing lineup. So along with the far stronger interest in non-oversampling DAC topology at that time, once Consonance switched the CD120 Balanced from the Philips to the Sony assembly, I then only featured the CD120 Linear. I set the North American retail price at $995 for each, and felt both sounded better (though quite different from one another) than anything at that price point.
Though no ones likely interested, I keep a Consonance Reference 2.0 SACD player for myself. I rescued a pile of 21 of them, and got at least 16 of the second generation units back on their feet. I love the tube output and analog volume control that provide excellent sound without needing to use a preamplifier even if I sometimes do. Its sonics get nosed out by the Reference 2.2 MKII CD player, though the SACD capability is a trump card for me. And that Sony SACD part has so far (knock on wood) held up. When this player dies, it owes me nothing
