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In Reply to: Teac Esoteric Transport mechanism = VRDS-NEO posted by DevillEars on April 8, 2007 at 14:19:56:
DevillEars, you have let me down another track. As I mentioned before the P-03 etc are over the top for me to digest, but maybe the UX-1 MK2 is worth following up. Google search reveals heaps of foreign posts on this so it obviously has a following.John (being led astray yet once again!)
Do not criticise the idiots in this world - we need them as they make the rest of us look so much better :-)
Follow Ups:
I'm also afraid that I'm not able to comment on their UX-1 Mk2 as I've only seen it on static display at our local audio expo last August (The P-03 being the "star of their firmament" at the time).Besides, I'm more into 2-channel audio-only and am very happy with my old Theta pairing of Data Basic II and Gen Va, so have'nt gone out of my way to seriously investigate universal players.
Maybe some further googling will elicit more useful and relevant info...
DevillEars
Not sure about that UX-1 Mk2. I eventually dug up the following, apparently unbiased, review at "Secrets of Home Theatre" which casts some doubt on the video ability (which everyone raves about on the much less expensive Denon) but makes only passing reference to the audio. However it appears to be describing the Mk1, not the Mk2. I quote (without permission):The Teac Esoteric UX-1 Universal DVD player represents the most expensive player we’ve tested to date. I am generally not very fond of boutique players (definition: made in small quantities, sophisticated appearance, very expensive). Some consist of a rebadged mid-line player with a spruced up audio section and a pretty packaging but really nothing special in terms of performance. I was almost afraid of what I might find with this player in those regards, but thankfully, I was pleasantly surprised.
The UX-1 is an original player from the ground up. If I were to compare it to anything else design wise, it has some striking similarities to the rare Samsung HD-1000, but these are loose similarities. The player is a work of art and without a doubt the nicest looking and best built player I’ve ever seen. The entire outer shell is made of brushed aluminum, and even the tray is made of the same material. The connectors on back are enormous and as solid as anything I’ve ever used. Even the buttons on the front face plate and their backlighting would make most players envious.
But for the Benchmark, those things don’t mean much. At the end of the day, it is about video performance, and this is where boutique players very rarely, if ever, fair well. The UX-1 may be the new exception to that rule.
The UX-1 uses a Mitsubishi MPEG decoder coupled with a Genesis FLI-2310 video processing chip. Just to get the bad news out on the table; the player does suffer from the macroblocking problem commonly associated with this chip. In fact, it is probably one of the worst with the issue so far and probably only second to the previously mentioned Samsung HD-1000. Using my reference scene from A Bug’s Life, the artifacts were clearly visible and quite distracting. If you are considering this player be sure to test it out first on your display if possible, as the problem only manifests itself with certain displays and may not affect yours.
The player features component progressive outputs, via BNC connectors, and via DVI with support for 480p, 720p, and 1080i with HDCP compliant displays. It also has full support for PAL playback in these modes and another bonus, full PAL to NTSC conversion. It is very rare that a manufacturer actually tells you that they support this feature but Teac included the option in its setup menus.
Attention to detail does not stop there either. When playing back via DVI there are some nice features for set-up, including selection of RGB mode. Here you can select either PC RGB levels or Studio RGB levels. The problem is, the Studio RGB levels are set incorrectly. The engineers at Teac set the black and white levels to digital 16 and 235 appropriately, but unfortunately they cut out the head and toe room that allow for below-black and above-white content. I am working with their engineers now to resolve this issue, and they have been very responsive on trying to get the problems worked out. This is extremely rare for a high line outfit in my experience, and I applaud them on their wiliness to support their product to the utmost degree.
The Faroudja implementation is extremely good here with only one small caveat. There is no support for 2-2 processing with NTSC material. The player does however support 2-2 processing with a PAL output, which is completely appropriate. But there is a lot of 2-2 based video material authored in the NTSC format so I hope that they will add this with a future firmware.
On the core side the player is good, but not perfect. There are no signs at all of Y/C delay, and the video frequency response is superb. Via the component outputs, the white level is spot on at 100 IRE, but again the player has issues with below-black information. There is also has some pixel cropping on the left and right side of the image that is a little excessive. I am working with their engineers to get this solved.
The player has no chroma issues at all, and the chroma filters and cross color suppressor settings of the Faroudja chip all seem to be set appropriately.
Overall this is by far the best boutique player I’ve had the opportunity to test, but at this price point I wouldn’t expect anything else. It still has its shortcomings which I hope Teac works out, but its performance was far better then I expected. Stay tuned for our review on the audio performance, which is excellent.
John
Do not criticise the idiots in this world - we need them as they make the rest of us look so much better :-)
You wrote:"Not sure about that UX-1 Mk2. I eventually dug up the following, apparently unbiased, review at "Secrets of Home Theatre" which casts some doubt on the video ability (which everyone raves about on the much less expensive Denon) but makes only passing reference to the audio. However it appears to be describing the Mk1, not the Mk2. "
Firstly, any publication with a name like that has a definite and defined target audience that is implicit in the publication's title - and that audience will, at best, give equal weighting to both video and audio (as you are), or be more hung-up about the video side of things (both from a picture quality AND "latest feature count").
Publications with defined target audiences that are niches of a larger segment are, automatically and by design, "biased" as what they will look for and how they will assess what they find will be done from the perspective of their target readership. Also, the reviewers level of grasp of audio may be lower than the grasp of video and, in audiophile terms, may be woefully inadequate. That's "Challenge Number One"...
Challenge Number Two, on the other hand, is linked more to the different levels of "technological maturity" in digital audio and digital video.
Challenge Number Three is a by-product of No 2 and is the current "rate of technological progress" (as driven by market demand) between digital audio (minimal) and digital video ("maximal") resulting in multiple standards at the underpinning technology level. Examples of these include physical media (HD-DVD vs BluRay), encoding/decoding standards, compression algorithms (lossy vs lossless), display technology war (Plasma vs LCD), device to display connection (analog vs digital; connector-type; cables; etc).
So, what you are faced with is two parallel development processes:
1) Digital Audio (around since the early '80s)
2) Digital Video (virtually a 21st century phenomenon)The first is more mature, has survived format wars, and has seen the market split and segmented until (in 2-channel mode particularly) it has started to decline.
The second is still immature, is in the middle of format wars, lacks an obvious winner, etc.
So, given the above, what should someone do (with a balanced need for both good audio and good video performance)?
Well, pure logic dictates that, in an area characterised by rapid technological advances and multiple standards, one DOES NOT "buy the most expensive boutique models", but rather look for something with designed-in "future-proofing" - where the manufacturer has adopted a modular plug-n-play approach with the designed-in capability for these modules to be exchanged at a later date as the technology advances. This would justify the high initial cost as it would extend the useable life to give a reasonable ROI.
If no such "Utopian Device" exists, then settle on a lower cost compromise or "trade-off", where - right from the outset - one acknowledges that this is a temporary acquisition, is not OTT costly, delivers "state-of-the-art" functionality with acceptable quality, etc, etc....
The dilemma outlined regarding relative maturity of audio vs video is why I've kept the two totally separate - each in their own room with no component overlap. It's also why I've stuck to vinyl and red-book digital and ignored both SACD and DVD-A from a music program perspective, and why, from a movie watching slant, I have a Denon HTIB system which is more than adequate until the standards begin to stabilise.
Finally, the MP3 / download / iPOD / etc. fad looks set to stay and to expand into more than just audio. I spotted an article in HFN&RR on a new device from Meridian which will dock a video iPOD and upscale it's video picture to 1080P... So, your question needs to take into account another category of source medium - solid-state memory (also HDD-based) and source devices such as PC's, laptops, iPODs etc... This trend has the potential to see the Internet replace any and all physical media for both audio and video applications - making it even more inadvisable to buy OTT components...
I'm 10 years younger than you are (or, depending on perspective, you're 10 years older than I am) and - having seen some of my peers from university days begin to shuffle off this mortal coil - have stopped making long-term purchases...
I'm investigating a Esoteric UX-1 Limited edition - no modding required with that unit. Depends on how competitive the price ends up. Used ones become available from time to time and I'm chasing one at the moment. One trap is to make sure it is a 240V model that suits here + make sure it is region free. I must also check out it will play DVD-R burned discs. I'll use the highly modded Benchmark DAC1 with it for CDs.John
Do not criticise the idiots in this world - we need them as they make the rest of us look so much better :-)
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