Esoteric X-01 Limited or new D-03/P-03

Guidocorona,
I know what you mean, but noisy ballbearings are ones from the first day to their dead in 20 or 40 or whatelse years. The noise will be generated by their ball rattling into their steel houses.
Believe me I loved the sound of the P-01. But I could not accept the noise. My former player was a loudless! Accuphase DP 77. The P-01 I got, was not a brand new one. It was some month in action at the dealers show room.

To define "loudless": The Philips drive is specified with:
33 dB; microphone in 10 cm (= 4") distance; angle 90 degrees; room noise less than 20 dB.
I cannot hear anything with my ear in approx. 4" distance to the closed transport (closed by a 5mm thick Plexiglass. That is -for me- loudless.

Dear Deshapiro,
be glad about your noiseless X-01 limited.
If my former P-01 were noiseless I would have been a happy Esoteric fan. But the Japanese Esoteric Technical Support Manager told me: Yes we have problems (at the customers) with the ball bearings noise. We work hard to solve the problems. We can reduce (but not kill) the noise by using "filled" ball bearings.
regards Dittersdorf

Guidocorona,
there is only one possibility to kill the noise, hearable at our listening chairs:
The Esoteric people have to isolate !! the drive mechanism from the housing. Until now they do the opposite thing: They screw all metallic parts together.
But think into the details about noise: noise is always caused by vibrations. About that it is absolutely clear that the drive mechanism vibrates. And these (very small) amplitudes one can hear in the sound: in some regions the Esoteric sound is always cool digitalistic.

Guidocorona,
the noise is caused by the two ball bearings. Meanwhile i am specialist in ball bearings :-)
The history of the ball bearings based Esoteric drives is the following:
After I had the P-01 transport at home, pressed the "on" knob I was near to get a heart attac: a loud noise which becomes more aggressive the faster it runs. I opened the P-01 and all was clear: I had overwiewed that two ball bearings were used to construct the drive. I tried to decrease the noise with felt etc. but nothing helps. The transport mechanism was rigidly screwed with the whole p-01 housing. The whole housing radiates the noise. The Japanese technician told me by mail: Send it back to us, we will update it. The noise will be reduced !!
My P-01 contained normal steel ball bearings without any grease in. Meanwhile they use in the P03 ball bearings made of ceramic and filled with grease. The noise of the p03 is let say 10-20% of the former p01. But i could hear it on my place 2,5m away from the spkrs.
All users should know: All! ball bearings make noise, without exception, otherwise the balls cannot move!
I could sell my P01 back. The whole P01 desaster costs me 6250 $ loss. After I had have the P03´s noise in my room I never will touch an Esoteric drive.

hello,
could compare both at the Munich HighEnd this year.
There is no doubt: P03/D03 is the much better choice. Why?
The transport is much more quiet than the X-01´s one. I think you know whats the reason - if not, see the details under their website.
The DAC D-03 is much more modern than the "oldfashioned" BurrBrown based in the X-01. See the website + the nice sixmoons test.
Which sound did they serve ? The X-01 sounds in comparison to much digitalistic. A piano sounded glass-clear and precise but somewhat cool - not as a piano sounds in nature. The P03/D03 let it sound much more natural, especially when the CD-datas were sampled up to DSD - formate.
I get this combo today for 10 days. The transport I use since 6 months is a Philips based one with a sophisticated sample rate converter - developed by Michael Pavischitz who is also responsible for the former Dynaudio Arbiter pre- and power amps (see Google under Arbiter). This transport sounds remarkable better than my former Reimyo.
If there is an interest, I can give some more details about the sound of the P-03/D-03 - combo. Let me compare some days.
My LS are studio monitors Klein und Hummel O500C (see www.klein-hummel.de under "studio", etc.)with inherent DAC´s. Thats the reason why i need only a transport. The DAC´s accept max. 48 kHz sample frequency. If one choose a higher rate (88,1 or 96 or 176,2 kHz or DSD) one has to use an external DAC between the Transport and the studio monitors.
regards Dittersdorf

Of course at the Munic HighEndShow the X-01 Limited was shown.
Especially after upsampling from PCM to DSD music ! flows through the room.
Remarkable is that the P03/D03´s sound without any clock was better than with one.

Have had the P03/D03 for one week at home. The sound is very natural, but you can hear in a quiet room P03´s ball bearing noise at your seat 2,5m away from the transport. This construction based on 2 ball bearings is the most stupid one you can imagine. Have owned the P01 some month ago. Its noise was much louder than P03´s but I ask Esoteric: why noisy ball bearings ? Other manufacturers offer SACD transports which are loudless.
Because Esoteric is not able to offer a loudless transport, I would try to become happy with Accuphase´s newest DP 78. It includes the same AD 1955 chips. It gets in Germanys HiFi&Records a phantastic test.
I think, offering 25 years after the invention of CD transport mechanismns a transport which makes a lot of noise is a bad joke.
Dittersdorf