Beyond green with envy.
Does Esoteric have their own factory or are all the components made in a Tokyo TEAC facility?
Esoteric’s factory is in Japan where their products are made, but they do have a service center for repairs in the US. They also have a few distribution centers or dealers, in the US.
I had to have a part replace before. I sent it to the repair center and they had to get the defective replacement part from Japan and it took quite a long time, but they replaced the part and tested it, then sent it back to me.
I forgot the preamp is dual mono all the way to the power cords, now I have to get 2 power cords. That’s another $12k for 2 Galileo’s. This is getting expensive! But it’s totality worth it once you hear what the sound this preamp is capable of.
@JimCook My new AV console shipped from Turkey with scheduled delivery on Monday 11/3. Today I got an email from UPS saying that a tariff of $191 would need to be collected for delivery…
Ouch
Ok … short version - I bought it (the Meitner MA3i) !
In comparison to another Dac at my dealer that was on my shortlist, it was cleaner, had slightly more instrument isolation, a sense of quietness and calmness that came through. In contrast to that, there seems to be more ‘heft’ or ‘meat on the bone’ in the presentation. This increase in solidity to the music provided a more descriptive landscape, width, height and depth … more 3d. Vocalists and instruments were more well defined and easier to pin point. This lifted the music from the bounds of my dealer’s speakers that were in service (Fischer & Fischer 470Ms). The speakers were now that next step to vanishing in the performance stage.
These initial comments and differences were exaggerated more so when I got it home when I compared it to my Airlens/DS Dac Mk2 combination. The Meitner is yet to be fully run in, so I expect some minor improvements over the next couple of weeks.
I haven’t had an audition on the MU2, but the price differential was really getting beyond my current budget - so I can’t comment on any comparison with that popular Dac. (in case you were wondering). 
Other general comments, despite being relatively lighter to the PS Audio Mk2 dac, it did surprise me with the sense of weight. Still not a heavy pine by any means, but you could tell that there was some heft and quality to it.
I haven’t played around with the pre portion of it, I’ve discovered it needed a firmware upgrade which went very smoothly via the app ‘MConnect’. Took all of 2-3 mins.
There is a big display (not colour like the PMG Dac) but it does show all main details clearly.
I’ve got Monday off as leave and Tuesday is a public holiday here in Victoria/Australia for the ‘Melbourne’ Cup’ so I’ll be running it in and playing with it the whole weekend. Nothing quite like have a public holiday for a horse race!)
Cheers
Kevin
Haven’t posted in a while. Couple of upgrades I’m going through.
- Updated my SR Speaker kit from mark 1’s to mark 2’s, after trialing them at home, a worthwhile upgrade.
- I purchased a set of Ziro Audio Disclosure silver speaker cables, pre-owned, with the idea of upgrading my center channel cable.
(There’s a review on them by Paul Rigby on the net.)
I realized after I got them that I could use these for my main speakers.
I’ve used for years a pair of Kimber Select pure silver speaker cables with their matching jumpers leads as I couldn’t afford two sets of the cables.
The Kimber cables give a detailed smooth sound.
The new cables and center channel cables are the same length so that’s how I realized they could replace my jumper cables.
One oddity with the cables was that they were terminated with WBT 0610CU bananas.
What’s the point of putting copper bananas on a silver cable?
I removed the bananas and found the cables had been crimped with a copper band.
I purchased 8 WBT 0610AG bananas to replace the copper versions.
I cut off the copper crimp and cleaned the cables to remove any oxidation and got them soldered on the end tips with WBT 4% silver solder and then added the new silver bananas.
(I added a post about whether silver bananas need break in on the forum.)
Upshot is, they do.
I’ve been testing out the newly revised cables for the last couple of weeks, they are still settling in but I’ve found still the same detailed sound but with a touch more air and space than what I’m used to with the Kimber jumpers.
All in all I’m pleased with the upgrade.
Paul was talking about the four-foot rule this morning, and that was how I setup my FR30. But hey, I am home alone for two more weeks!
I have been playing with speaker placement all morning. Now I move FR30 one foot more into the room (so they are over 7’ measured from the front to the wall). I really like what I heard. The soundstage became deeper and bigger too. What surprised me was the music sounded fuller and the bass was even tighter. This biggie really needs room to breathe.
But I do not think my wife will like it when she is back from NY.
You can always lock her out…
I wish. It is usually the other way. 
Don’t say anything, maybe she won’t notice…
I should be able to cheat a few inches, and even a few inches helped more. 
You can also gain a little more openness with the FR30’s by playing with the rear firing tweeter.
That is right, I have set it up at “far” and “4” now, and I may play with it a bit to see if either 3 or 5 will make a difference.
I wanted to go back to read your review on the Stealth V18 vs. SR G. power cord again, but I couldn’t find it. Is it on a different thread? I only remember you said they are on par with each other but sound different. Anyway, the consensus is that V18 is better suited with power components and their Cloude Grande line is better with sources.
Here’s the link, Donald. I put it in the wrong thread, sorry. https://forum.psaudio.com/t/pmg-512-dac-first-impressions/42850/451?u=waymanchen11
You got off easy, the DHL delivery tariff on My Sonic Labs Diamond cartridge was $1,200.
Thanks! Golfing again so I’ll read it later🏌🏼
Ouch!!!
This is another confirmation (besides my own) that these topline cables often just sounded different. One may prefer one over the other from system to system.
Thanks again! I am contemplating on if I should get another overkill cable to try for fun. But I will probably do something else first.