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During the review period, I alternated between both sets of XLR cables as well as the i-link to build an aural image of the true nature of the Fives - not an easy task when sound can so dramatically change from one set of cables to the next and be tweaked a dozen ways by setting choices yet some common themes started to appear across all setups. Interestingly, a few weeks before I knew I'd review this gear reader Doug contacted me to discuss the addition of an Esoteric SA60 or McIntosh MCD201 to his system. Now those questions are usually very hard to answer because we have rarely heard the starting system to be upgraded but in this case, Doug owns a very similar system to a very good friend of mine -- Classé source, McIntosh amplifier and B&W 802D
Sidebar I: Before starting on this review, I was skeptical about digital cables having more than a just marginal impact on sound. As it turned out, the two digital cables I tested had more impact on the final sound than any of the settings on the Esoterics, any of the analog interconnects I tried and orders of magnitude more than the various power cables I own. Both digital cables use the same 110-ohm Neutrik XLR plugs so the differences can't be blamed on poor impedance matching or inadequate connections. They are exactly the same on both cables. The Ash is Zu's top digital cable using their B3 geometry, silver alloy conductors and copper shielding. A meter single XLR cable will cost you $249, therefore it will take $498 to connect the P05 to the D05 through the dual mono balanced inputs. As is common to all of Zu's best cables, the Ashs' strengths were fantastic transparency to small details and a vast soundstage. What came more as a surprise... continue
speakers -- so we chatted about the possible upgrade extensively. As fate had it, the P05/D05 headed my way and after a day or so, I fired an excited email to Doug asking him to wait for a while before buying anything as the Fives sounded like nothing I had heard before. It did not take much more incentive for Doug to get a loaner pair. For the first time, I enjoyed doing a review in parallel with one of our readers. This helped me tremendously in identifying the fundamental traits of the P05/D05.

Doug's first comments back to me were the exact same I had made to myself a few days before: "I have always looked for the elusive big full-bodied soundstage and I may have found it." That's clearly the first striking character of the P05/D05, a huge and powerful bass that serves as a foundation for a broad and deep soundstage. If your amplifier and speakers are up to the task, the Esoteric combo will paint tuneful, powerful and detailed bass that brings new life to the music; from Renaud Garcia-Fons' Legend to Bela Fleck's Music for Two, I did not so much hear a lot more bass but bass with texture and tonal diversity, bass with weight and rhythm. In Saint-Saens's Third Symphony under Munch, the organ's deeper notes remained subdued (even a pair of 10-inchers as in the RPDs can't duplicate a full-scale organ) but they went from monotone to far more colorful, varied and textured. Bass of this quality and quantity
will challenge your amplifier and expose its weaknesses. Any lack of control, especially with tube amplifiers, will be revealed mercilessly. Even the massive transformers of the MA2275 and its push-pull pair of KT88s did sound uneasy at times. The Genesis Reference on the other hand did not flinch once on the same tracks, affirming its solid-state steadfastness with bass.


Doug's second comment came back a coupla weeks later and related to voice reproduction: "Voices are also huge; they are warm, much larger than with the Classé and just seem more natural. Diana Krall & Michael Buble were like they were playing in my living room." That's an area certainly worth mentioning as the SA60 did not have me completely convinced with its reproduction of vocals. The slightly recessed midrange of the little brother and its not quite fully developed tone on CD playback were the primary reason for my reserve (SACD playback was an altogether different matter, with veracity and intimacy making a huge leap forward). The P05/D05 does not suffer from this lack of engagement in the midband. Actually, I'd go as far as saying that on properly recorded CDs, they are as engaging and textured while richer sounding than the SA60 on SACD playback.


The reason behind this addicting trait actually resides in the upper midrange and treble of the P05/D05 which is as smooth, undistorted and organic as I have heard from any digital source. We are not talking about rolled-off treble or tube harmonics here; the solid-state output stage is distortion free and considering how resolved the player is, I doubt anything gets subtracted to preserve sensitive ear drums. No, it is pure, extended and glare-free treble energy - elegance personified. The Ronin speakers are unforgiving in the upper range yet since the Esoteric separates have made it here, I have enjoyed the most stress-free, fatigue-free listening possible. Even the harmonically deprived and stiff CDs from the early 80s that had the SA60 stumble were made perfectly listenable. Actually no, strike the last comment - the P05/D05 made those discs enjoyable.


Which brings me to the last of the P05/D05 qualities but perhaps the most meaningful. If the SA60 is a great SACD player that plays CDs reasonably well (with a little effort on the partnering gear to work around the aforementioned vocal dryness), the P05/D05 is first and foremost an amazing 2-box CD player that also happens to nail SACD playback. The improvements brought by the Fives are far more obvious when playing CDs than SACDs. On SACD one will notice a little more resolution, slightly darker silences and a touch more tonal elegance but probably not enough to justify spending $10K more. On CDs, it's a whole nuther league. All other players in my house reproduce sounds, some even play music. The P05/D05 do not play, they place you at the recorded event, sonically and visually. Actually, my first comment to Srajan within a few days of audition was to wonder whether the SA60 and
P05/D05 were even from the same manufacturer considering how much more engaging the Fives were on CD playback. Our editor, being as laconic in his emails as he can be eloquent in his reviews, responded right away: "Yes, their upper-crust stuff is le crap." I couldn't put it any better. For our readers who know the Accuphase house sound, imagine the organic, smooth and rich sounding midrange Accuphase is famous for but with far more resolution, closeness to the event and extension on top and bottom.


The P05/D05 combo isn't completely perfect. Beyond the fact that they do not play DVD-As, they could use just a little more life and exuberance, a little more of that British PRAT; not much, just a touch more of music's raw energy could come through. That is particularly obvious when driving an amplifier direct from the variable outputs. I had noticed it when driving the amplifier stage of the MA2275 but this connection being single-ended, I had not really questioned it twice. When switching to the Genesis reference amplifier using the balanced variable outputs, the same trait surfaced - nothing major or offensive, the music did not suddenly turn lethargic. Yet it did not have quite the same drive as when the preamplifier stage of the MA2275 was in the signal path.


It is not possible to drive an amplifier directly from the outputs of my Musical Fidelity A5 CD player, hence I could not judge if the marginal slowing of pace was only due to the lack of preamplifier but when comparing the A5 and P05/D05 plugged into the McIntosh integrated, the A5 did seem to convey a little more passion and rush. A good portion of the perceived difference comes from the balance between transient edge and note decays and how both players handle that balance differently. The A5 focuses more on the forefront of the musical note, the P05/D05 more on decays, giving a greater sense of peace, ease and serenity where the British player offers more rush and attacks. As a result, the P05/D05 shone more brightly on large orchestral works than on small baroque ensembles but even in the latter case managed to redeem itself through exceptional tonal credibility and utter transparency, bringing the musicians home but maybe not all their explosive attacks.


Serenity with dense tones; deep, broad and powerful bass; treble that is elegance personified; extreme resolution that never attracts attention to itself; the P05/D05 deliver on all fronts that delight me to sound credible. Of all my audiophile fancies, credibility is probably the hardest to achieve and the Esoteric duo delivers it in spades. Doug ended up buying his demo pair and I... well, I am just enjoying the fact that 'mine' won't be going anywhere for a while, at least not until the review of the Genesis amplifier is completed in three months - ninety more days of the best music I have ever enjoyed but who is counting?


Sidebar II: It has been my observation that replacing a good active preamp with a discrete output stage with source-direct drive where the outputs tend to be IC powered nearly always punishes in the ways Frederic described. Also, a good preamp will swing 20 volts where most CD players do just 2. - Ed.

I'll close with one last reflection. As I experimented with various CD players in my house as transports, it became quickly evident that 90% of the performance comes from the D05 converter. Not that the P05 is not contributing to the overall achievement because it does play a role in the ultimate transparency, spaciousness and tonal accuracy of the combination... but the D05 alone can get you fairly close on its own. As always, the last few percents of performance are the most costly but what the P05 brings to the table for half the total cash outlay is a great illustration of the law of diminishing returns.

Sidebar III: Esoteric's R&D team comments: "We have spent more than two years to develop the VRDS-Neo MK5 mechanism, targeting lighter weight and lower cost while keeping the VRDS concept. The Mk5 is only a reduction of the P03 mechanism from a cost standpoint, not performance. To achieve this, we had to find new ideas from the beginning. For instance, in the P-03 mechanism, the motor is set above the turntable while the turntable and the spindle motor are fully integrated. In the Mk5, we have changed the motor position and moved it below the turntable. As a result, turntable and motor are separated when the disc comes in or out. Once the disc is in, it is clamped with the turntable, the motor is reconnected and from that point the mechanism operates like a P03. In addition, the mass of the turntable had to be reduced to use a smaller spindle motor. A hybrid structure for the turntable, with a polycarbonate base and aluminum, helped suppress vibrations. Finally and surprisingly, the clamping disc evolved into an open-reel shape, reminiscent of the identity of TEAC... continue


At $7500, the D05 is actually a good value, its musical abilities right up there in the rarefied strata where very exclusive and far more expensive DACs roam. When you add the diversity of inputs, the ability to impart elegance to all digital sources in a system and even the variable outputs, the D05 becomes the unquestionable star of the pair. Actually, owners of SA60s, DV60s or DV50s equipped with i-link outputs looking to improving the quality of their stereo system might connect to a D05 via i-link. It will provide a more stable clocking signal and not interfere with the performance of the surround and LFE channels. My only regret is that at that price, Esoteric did not choose a clearer way to connect into the sources of today and tomorrow. USB would have been nice, compatibility with a computer Firewire port even better and WiFi capability broken new ground altogether for a DAC of this performance level and price. Foregoing completely the direct use of a computer source (save for sound cards with S/PDIF coaxial outputs which already belong to the past) warrants the question of the future for DACs like this Esoteric which are almost exclusively dedicated to disc spinners (a category to which I happily belong today but for how much longer?).


The redeeming factor for the D05 and its partner is their ability to bring SACD playback to its full potential but with more and more high-resolution files available for download and the foretold demise of SACD, even that advantage may soon be irrelevant. I started this review wondering why Esoteric would celebrate their 20th anniversary with a new 'middle of the range' series. There is nothing middle of the range to the P05/D05 and their ability to transport you where the music takes place. No-expense-spared designs by Esoteric and others may have even more transparency and certainly a touch more PRaT and exuberance, passing on more of the raw energy of the music - but I doubt they can surpass the new pair in pure tonal accuracy and richness. The P05/D05 have made questionable CDs not just listenable but enjoyable again and turned my best recorded CDs and SACDs into brand new experiences and new enjoyment closer to the real event than ever before. Musically, the Fives are all I could hope for - yet I leave this review feeling that the D05 could have been so much more, the beginning of a new era for Esoteric, had it only looked a little farther ahead to the PC compatibility of where our hobby is headed. But then, vinyl is still here and will remain for the foreseeable future. Perhaps Esoteric is correct and there will be a place for no-compromise transports and DACs in the near future that don't bother with hard drives or streaming files. If so, the P05/D05 unequivocally belongs to and in this future.
Quality of packing: Very sturdy triple boxing and wrapping.
Reusability of packing: Short of water damage, I can't think of what could reasonably make this packaging unusable.
Ease of unpacking/repacking: The reasonable weight makes the operation relatively easy.
Condition of component received: Flawless except for scratches from previous uses.
Completeness of delivery: No issue.
Quality of owner's manual: Great progress over the SA60, fully self-explanatory.
Website comments: Marketing information available; little technical information beyond manual.
Warranty: The limited warranty on current models is 2 years parts and labor but upon registering with the "Product Registration Form" supplied, Esoteric will extend your warranty by an additional year for a total of 3 years parts and labor.
Global distribution: Check website for distributors; broad distribution worldwide.
Human interactions: Always courteous.
Other: I-link connection is not compatible with computer Firewire ports.
Pricing: Good value for the D05 but could have offered more in terms of integrating with computer-based systems. The P05, although a great transport, is harder to rationalize at that price when an SA60 with i-link would be cheaper and offer most of the stereo performance with surround capabilities in addition.
Application conditions: The D05 is a great upgrade path for the front 2 channels of a surround system relying on a DV60 or SA60. The P05/D05 is even superior sounding together but their combined price becomes quite a hurdle. Hopefully a one-box player with VRDS NEO 5 and the AKM chip at the current X-03SE price is on Esoteric's to-do list for the not-so-distant future (and a couple of digital inputs would be nice, too).
Final comments & suggestions: If price is not a concern and you have no immediate plan to move on to a computer-based system, then this new pair from Esoteric can easily be the source you invest in to spin CDs and SACDs for the next ten years without ever having to go back and wonder if it was the right choice. Their sonic elegance, serenity and plain ability to make even the most challenged CDs enjoyable are truly unique. Especially the dual balanced digital cables will be absolutely critical to extract the full potential of the pair.
Esoteric's website