New Esoteric P02 D02

Happy New Year to all of you...hope you are all still enjoying your Esoteric gear! I would love to be able to move up to the Grandioso P1/D1 level but that is just not in the cards as they say....

I'm in the middle of what will be a hard-fought upgrade transaction with a very difficult seller (have 40+ pages of email and other comms, glad to provide details on this challenge and the seller so people can avoid him,....communicate with me on in-mail) and after a month, finally have a P-02 installed in the system in place of my 7 1/2 tried and true P-03U Transport. The D-02 is still outstanding and will likely become a 'longer story' with a potentially legally troublesome ending (for the Valley Stream & Lynbrook NY-based seller in question) so the P-02 is feeding my existing D-03 Dual Mono DAC with incredible results.

The holy grail of this hobby so to speak, is to be able to achieve very detailed and accurate playback with all possible inner detail retrieved from the recorded medium while also having organic, musical and non-fatiguing playback. As much as I love the P-03U/D-03 combo all these years, it's hard to put into words what additionally the P-02 brings to the table. The difference and upgrade in all these key areas is not subtle and is incredibly impressive! I'm extremely happy with the P-02 after only 2-3 days and cannot wait for the D-02 to arrive!

I was able to find another D-02 in 9/10 condition from an outstanding seller on Audiogon (see my most recent feedback, this guy is great to deal with) and solve my immediate issue; the D-02 has arrived and is up and running with the P-02 as a matching set thus replacing my tried and true 7 1/2 year old P-03U and D-03 which will get posted shortly.

All I can say is "WOW!" in terms of the improvements that the new 02 combo brings to the table; they extract so much more from anything I've thrown at them and provide a massive sound stage with incredible depth and great imaging while still providing a very organic and musical presentation. In addition, the frequency range and particularly deep bass resolution and extension of the new 02 combo is truly "off the charts!"

I've experimented with various settings in the first 24 hours and thus far I am tending towards burning in the following combination first;

- upconversion PCM->4Fs (176.4) on P-02
- digital filter set to On (P-02)
- P-02 set to output ESL3 protocol
- upsampling set to 176.4 (D-02), ELS3 *dual XLR inputs"
- digital filter set to FIR1 (D-02)
- clock frequency 176.4 with G-03x driving (will try D-02, no G-03x at some point)

I've read several reviewer/other posts and have tried S_DLY1 (apodizing) filter1 as well as NoFilter on the D02 and NoFilter on the P02. Thus far, the above seems to be the best overall settings for my ears and how the units sound now but we'll see how things burn it and how it turns out overall. I will also try up-converting to both PCM via Dual XLR at 352.8 and PCM->DSD up-conversion at some point though initial tests of each seemed to indicate the above list is where I am going to start.

There are so many options with how these can be configured (have not even gone near the USB input yet!) that I look forward to a long and happy set of experiments and alot of listening with these units.

As for that seller of the first D02, a legal demand letter has been issued late last week, and the hunt will continue with the appropriate outside agencies if the DL is not responded to per its terms. If anyone's been through anything like this and can provide feedback/additional ideas please let me know through 1:1 private in-mail. Thank you!

I've done additional testing both with and without the G-03x and the master clock in the D-02 yields at least equal results to having the extra OCXO standalone clock (G-03X) in the system. I currently have pulled the G-03X out of the circuit and will now post it with the P-03U and D-03 when I offer them.

I've got the D-02 set to output a master word clock out at 512x44.1 (22.5792 MHz) to allow the full range of upconversion rates and DSD playback with the P-02 slaved to the D-02's master clock. Great results,...here is the current config;

- up-conversion PCM->4Fs (176.4) on P-02
- digital filter set to On (P-02)
- P-02 set to output ESL3 protocol
- up sampling set to 176.4 (D-02), ELS3 *dual XLR inputs", this is 48bit output!!!
- digital filter set to FIR1 (D-02)
- clock frequency 22.5792MHz master clock output from D-02, P-02 clocked to D-02

Congrats. I play it with up sampling at ESL3 at transport, so 48/176.4. At DAC I leave up convert to ORG. In my case I do not use digital filters but have to say have not really tired extensively any of them.

Clock frequency as you, but with the G01. I think you are doing well by selling the G03. In my opinion you will get better results using the D02 alone. At some point in the future do try the G01.

Congrats

Hi Zephyr, may I suggest to give S_dly2 a spin. On K-01 at least, I found it to be more extended than S_dly1, with greater staging/imaging, and equally musical.

G.