Looking for a CD / SACD player. Also, tell me about Esoteric

Esoteric's parent company Teac has been making some of the best CD drives on the planet for decades. They used to sell to OEM's but now keep all their drives to them selves in Teac/Esoteric's CD players etc. great players if not some of the best on the market right now. There simply is not that many CD drives (OEM) being made anymore so almost everyone is using the same few drives in their players, regardless of manufacture. Esoteric uses their own (Teac) drives and have been for decades.

That said I have no idea what the digital side of the house sounds like been a couple decades since I owned one.  maybe consider one of their CD/SACD transports and an outboard DAC. 

OP, take a look at Marantz. The SACD30n sounds amazing, has excellent DACs and a butt-load of options. $3,500 or so.

if you can find a Denon DCD-A110, it’s amazing as well.

As a fan of BluRay audio discs I'm perplexed as to why that isn't an automatic feature of the Esoteric line-up, or every high-end disc player.

I have only a stereo so the ATMOS and 5.1 audio options on the discs aren't of interest  to me.

My (discontinued) oppo UDP 205, Modwright version, is something to be experienced.

I have the McIntosh MCD12000.  Love it.  Check w/Reference Analog, they have a slightly used one for under 9k.  It has a built in DAC as well.