Esoteric DV-50 vs Denon DVD9000


Does anyone have experience on both machine? An audiophile I knew recently told me that DVD9000 wins on CD performance over DV-50.

From my understanding, there are filters at the front panel of DV-50 is tune the analog signal coming out from the player. Also the VRDS transport provudes accurate sonic.

Frankly, I dont have good impression on DVD9000 due to an experience of transport skipping problem from DVD5000 and the disappointing sonic performance.

Anyway, Stereophile had a great passage on DV-50 in recent issue. Trust worthy?

I have ever audited DV-50 and compared with some famous competitors like Accuphase DP-85, EMC1UP, Marantz SA-1, Nu Vista 3D CDP, etc. DV-50 performance really close (win sone and lose some). Did I miss something important or Denon DVD9000 really that good?
lafish
Selling point for Marantz DV8400 is DVI-2 output. Does anyone compared the DVI output from DV8400 against pic quality from DV-50?
I haven't tried the Denon, but I have compared the Esoteric to the Marantz DV-8400, which has gotten quite good reviews on sound. The Marantz was very respectable on CD and SACD and impressive on DVD-A. The Esoteric is on another level altogether--on DVD-A it is far superior to the Marantz, on SACD it stands up on almost even terms to the Classe Omega on SACD and beats it on CD, and on CD it isn't far behind my dCS Purcell/Elgar combo--and it isn't completely broken in yet. Unless someone can tell me the Denon can compete on that level, the comparison in question is apples and oranges.
According to the Soundstage.com review of the DV-50, it does NOT have the Tead VRDS transport, but does use some features of that famed unit, such as the clamping device.

I too have had trouble with a Denon player (tracking/laser issues), and their customer service fairly-well screwed me - so no more Denon for me. This is just my experience from a while ago, so I cannot comment of comparitive sound quality.