With my assignment high-priced amps, preamps, loudspeakers, and turntables, I started off by heading to the big rooms in the Venetian Tower. First up was the Esoteric–Cabasse room, where Esoteric was showing the latest incarnations of its “2” series, the Tokyo-made C-02X stereo line-stage preamplifier and S-02 stereo amplifier ($20,000 each). In a classic case of “trickle-down engineering” (which actually works, while trickle down economics rarely does), the preamp uses the same dual-layer supercaps as in the Grandioso ($40,000). It’s a fully balanced design, with a separate volume control for each phase of each channel. The sound is claimed to be faster, lighter, and more highly resolved, with a “big open soundstage.”
The class A/B, 145Wpc, S-02 is a dual-mono design that with fully balanced input and output stages. Its large bipolar LAPT (linear amplifier power transistor) supply help contribute to performance that is said to be faster and more responsive, with a very high damping factor.
Both components were placed on an eye-catching Grand Prix equipment rack. Mated with an Esoteric K1-X top level player, Shunyata Research power treatment, AudioQuest silver cabling, Cabasse Iroise loudspeakers, and a Cabasse Santorin subwoofer, the system delivered surprisingly gray sound that was muddy in the middle.
