Is the RAM Modified Esound E5 the REAL THING?

Upon closer inspection on the RAM website nothing makes sense. The same superclock installed in the Oppo or an Esoteric is drastically different in price. Why? It appears that the price of mods is dependent on the price of the machine, and not on the price of the actual mod.

Think you are getting models confused, Audiocom Superclock 4 is same price on all RAM mods.........the newest Audiocom Ultraclock is more expensive.

I have an Eastsound E5 stock and for the $750 purchase price it sounds great and has nice build quality and stock parts list is impressive at this price. The guys at RAM do mods for Esoteric units and have opportunity to compare sound to other modded units in house like E5. I don't doubt that RAM honestly feel thier fully modded E5 sounds better than stock Esoteric unit, doesn't mean that everyone will agree however.

I have had 4-5 pieces of gear modded by them, I like thier flexibility to work within your budget on almost any type of audio gear.

Also I think someone who buys Eastsound E5 and then has it modded is not the same customer that buys very expensive stock Esoteric CD player, so you may not find someone who has actually owned both

BTW I purchased my E5 1-2 yrs ago and price has increased since then, also Eastsound has improved E5 version called "signature" for slightly more cost.

Megasam,

Please don't take this as attacking but look at the price of the super clock 4 with PSU for the following, this is what I get from their website: Esound: $590, Marantz 8001: $700, Marantz SA-11: $750. You are correct, the Esoteric ones are the same.....it just seems the Marantz has the escalating pricing.

Hi Arbuckle,

Thanks for the interest in our products.

The reason why the Superclock 4/PSU are different prices for those machines is the extra time (labor) and extra mounting and wiring that is needed for the different machines. What is not clearly defined in the description is that Audio Consulting Silver wire and Cotton tubing is used for the connections (some have more wiring than others), and we have to develop custom mounting apparatus per the different machine, this takes time and parts cost. The Esound is the easiest of them all, very simple (hence the lowest price of this group), the SA8001 requires special mounting (has to be mounted in a certain location to sound the best) and much more wiring and the SA-11 uses a special Superclock frequency that is special order per project, and there is also some special mounting and prepping done there too.

I hope this answers your questions, and please feel free to contact me privately for more info on this or for some on getting feedback from our Esound customers (with their consent first) on your original question of this thread. Most (if not all) of our Esound customers do not really post here on Audiogon, but they are out there.

Best Regards,
Douglas Jesse
Reference Audio Mods