Any experience with the Esoteric UX-1

LBSILVER, you have a legitimate concern. Give a call to John as I suggested. He does carry both brands and is very familiar with UX-1. He will give you his very knowledgeable opinion.
I have personally compare X-01 with the Burmester 001 and Bel Canto PL1-a. They were all on the same system. X-01 was so much better than Burmester it was like night and day. Bel Canto was closer to X-01, but still no cigar.
My detailed findings are on the following thread:
http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?ddgtl&1090867688&openfrom&4&4#4

Sorry, I have not heard the Ayre player. I think Guidocorona's advice is right-on.

Steve

In last months issue of Absolute sound there was a review of both the high end Esoteric players. The reviewer directly compared them to the Ayre D1-X and in both cases he prefered substatially the sound of the Ayre player. I have never heard the Esoteric stuff, but do own the Ayre and of all the digital I've owned it sounds the best to me, and the picture is amazing as well

I heard and saw a comparison of the UX-1 versus the Immersive Technology Simmetry and it was ugly for as good as the UX-1 was it simply could not muster the level of performance the Simmetry in either audio and certainly not video either.

The Simmetry is pretty amazing and it half the price.

Made in USA too.

The Ayre is nice too, but even if the audio is the same as the Simmetry the video will several notches down. So if video matters a good deal check out the Simmetry.

I don't know if you need video, but I recently auditioned the new Ayre universal player in my system and was completely knocked out......... I had a couple of other nice CD players on hand for comparison as well, and the Ayre left everything in the dust. FWIW The dealer who helped me with the audition is also an Esoteric dealer and reccommends the Ayre players head and shoulders above the Esoteric.