DS Audio DS 001 Eccentricity Detection/Correction Device

Since the advent of Thomas Edison’s cylinder-based phonograph in 1877 and Emile Berliner’s disc-based gramophone a decade later, the record player has brought pleasure to untold millions. It is a brilliant invention that literally changed the way the world experiences music. Before it was introduced, a listener had to go to a concert, recital, or dance hall (or be musical enough to play an instrument) to hear an ensemble or a singer and accompanists perform; after the gramophone and the rubber/shellac/vinyl disc became commercial realities, he and his family and friends could enjoy the music of their choosing in their homes any time they wanted.

From the start, the gap between the sound of recordings and the sound of the real thing has been an issue. Back in the day, folks like Edison used to conduct demonstrations in which live vocalists and recorded ones (often recorded to cylinder on the spot) “performed” side by side—to demonstrate how small that gap was. At the time, people were amazed by the verisimilitude of the recordings! Times change, of course, and what was considered highest-fidelity playback at the turn of the twentieth century now sounds coarsely mechanical. The stability and silence with which today’s turntables rotate, the precision with which tonearms and cartridges track grooves, the quality of the recordings themselves are infinitely better—and that chasm between live and Memorex has, indeed, been narrowed.

Still, some things, some drawbacks, haven’t been addressed—and one of the most persistent of them will be the subject of this review.

Today we don’t pay much attention to the wow and flutter figures of turntables. Typically, the rates at which they rotate the LPs atop them have become so precise that frequency and pitch instability (caused by fluctuations in playback speed) aren’t the problems that they once were. However, wow and flutter aren’t only induced by turntables. As REG never tires of pointing out, some degree of eccentricity (the opposite of concentricity or perfect centering) can be—and most likely is—“built into” all your vinyl recordings, either because of a slightly offset spindle hole or an imprecise pressing, in which the puck of heated vinyl was not perfectly centered beneath the stamper, or the stamper itself was slightly canted in its carriage.

Why should the concentricity of an LP be so important? For two reasons. “The first,” in DS Audio’s words, “is that unstable rotation [owed to the eccentricity of the grooves] causes fluctuations in pitch across the frequency range. The second is that if record eccentricity is not corrected, the cartridge and tonearm will sway from side to side as they trace the groove walls, impairing the stylus’ ability to accurately ‘read’ the signals engraved in them,” resulting in “muddiness” and an “unstable sonic image.” DS Audio contends that LP eccentricity can result in wow and flutter values that are “20 times worse than those of a turntable alone.”

So, how come no one’s done something about this longstanding and quite audible problem? Well, someone did. As readers of REG know, in 1983 the Japanese firm Nakamichi introduced its direct-drive Dragon-CT Computing Turntable with integral viscous-damped tonearm. This ingenious device not only measured the eccentricity of LPs (via a separate “sensor tonearm”) but corrected for it by moving the platter itself so that concentricity was made perfect.

Alas, the Nakamichi Dragon-CT is no longer manufactured, though used samples can still be found on the Internet (for a pretty penny). Of course, the Dragon-CT was, by today’s standards, a bit of a one-trick pony (though its trick was phenomenal). Since its drive system and dedicated tonearm were early-80s’ tech, the best contemporary ’tables and ’arms outperform it in every way, save one—that unique ability to measure and correct for the wow and flutter induced by LP eccentricity.

Since Nakamichi’s Dragon-CT, no company I know of has introduced a product that is specifically intended to deal with the almost inevitable eccentricity of LPs. Until now.

Meet the DS Audio ES-001 Eccentricity Detection Stabilizer. At $6000, it ain’t cheap. And, of course, it only does the one thing. But, boy, does it do it well.

Invented by the same DS Audio team (headed by Aki Aoyagi) that has brought you the progressively more and more marvelous DS optical cartridges, the ES-001 is a 2.75″-tall, two-part cylinder that fits over your turntable’s spindle. There is a 2.4″ touchscreen display panel on its top face, a power button near its base, and a rear screw (opened with a supplied Allen wrench) to remove the case when replacing batteries or updating software via a supplied cable.

As noted, the ES-001 has two interconnected and independently articulated parts. The taller section—the case-enclosed chassis—houses the electronics and the two AA batteries; the small cylindrical portion beneath it is intended to rotate with the record, while you hold the large top portion still. Once the ES-001 is turned on and the record and the bottom part of the ES-001 are rotating at speed, you trigger infrared LED lights and sensors built into the chassis to emit and receive beams, which measure the concentricity of the lead-out groove of the LP revolving around them, turning that data into a diagrammatic readout on the touchscreen panel that shows you exactly how eccentric your LP is.

Assuming you have enough play between the turntable spindle and the spindle-hole in the LP, you then turn off the turntable and push the LP in the direction that reduces its eccentricity, as shown on the LED-screen diagram. Keep pushing or wiggling until the words “The center is OK” appear on the screen (some of the time a small nudge is enough to do the trick), and you have now corrected the LP’s eccentricity. If you don’t have enough slack in the spindle hole to push the LP into perfect alignment, DS supplies a reamer that allows you to enlarge the spindle hole so that you have more room to adjust the position of the record. (If it isn’t obvious, be aware that enlarging the spindle hole with the reamer is an irreversible process—not that you’re likely to do any serious damage to your LP, save for making it fit less tightly on the spindle you’re presently using.)

While not unduly massive at 620 grams (1.37 pounds), the ES-001 has enough heft to serve as a record clamp once you’ve finished your measurements and adjustments and turned the device off. Of course, there are myriad dedicated record clamps on the market, all with their own sonic signatures. Whether you prefer the “sound” of the ES-001 when it is used as a clamp will be a personal decision.

One thing that won’t be a matter of opinion, however, is the sound you get after centering your LPs.

The sonic improvement that the ES-001 makes are consistent and consistently positive. They are almost exactly like the differences you see in a photo that was taken with a camera on a tripod and one that was taken handheld. Blur disappears, focus becomes tack-sharp, colors are more distinct and natural, depth of field and of image are clarified, ambient space around images is expanded, and performance/orchestration/recording details that were slightly fudged aren’t anymore. It is really quite a remarkable step toward neutrality and completeness, without which, of course, instruments and instrumentalists don’t sound as realistic.

If the ES-001 has a downside (other than its price), it is a peculiar one. To wit, I’ve been listening to certain LPs for better than 50 years, and I’m used to the way they sound with varying degrees of eccentricity (and varying amounts of wow and flutter) uncorrected. It can be a little disconcerting to hear them with those distortions removed. It may not be particularly absolute sound of me to say this, but, if you’re used to it, a certain amount of blur can be rather lovely, in the way that a pictorialist (as opposed to a realist) photograph or painting can look lovely. It certainly makes an old, favorite recording sound familiar (and not hearing it, doesn’t).

This said, there is no question that the ES-001 is a brilliant and successful bit of engineering. It does exactly what it is intended to do; it is easy to use (once you get the hang of it); and it unquestionably removes blur from and increases the neutrality and completeness of every LP I’ve used it with. If lifelike pitch and timbre, improved image focus, clarified soundstaging, and higher resolution are prime considerations—and how could they not be?—an LP lover could not put $6000 to better use than by purchasing an ES-001. It is not just a work of genius; it is a step change in analog playback and, quite appropriately, one of 2022’s TAS Products of the Year. (For vinyl fans, I’d have to say it is the Product of the Year—or Century.)

Specs & Pricing

Material: Aluminum and tungsten
Power supply: Two AA batteries
User interface: Touch panel (2.4 inch)
Dimensions: 80mm D x 70mm H
Weight: 620g (including batteries)
Price: $6000

MUSICAL SURROUNDINGS (U.S. Distributor)
(510) 547-5006
musicalsurroundings.com

JV’s Reference System
Loudspeakers: MBL 101 X-treme, Stenheim Alumine Five SE, Estelon X Diamond Mk II, Magico M3, Voxativ 9.87, Avantgarde Zero 1, Magnepan LRS+, MG 1.7, and MG 30.7
Subwoofers: JL Audio Gotham (pair)
Linestage preamps: Soulution 725, MBL 6010 D, Siltech SAGA System C1, Air Tight ATE-2001 Reference
Phonostage preamps: Soulution 755, Constellation Audio Perseus, DS Audio Grand Master
Power amplifiers: Soulution 711, MBL 9008 A, Aavik P-580, Air Tight 3211, Air Tight ATM-2001, Zanden Audio Systems Model 9600, Siltech SAGA System V1/P1, Odyssey Audio Stratos, Voxativ Integrated 805
Analog source: Clearaudio Master Innovation, Acoustic Signature Invictus Neo/T-9000, Walker Audio Proscenium Black Diamond Mk V, TW Acustic Black Knight/TW Raven 10.5, AMG Viella 12
Tape deck: Metaxas & Sins Tourbillon T-RX, United Home Audio Ultimate5 OPS
Phono cartridges: DS Audio Grandmaster, DS Audio Master1, DS Audio DS-003 Clearaudio Goldfinger Statement II, Air Tight Opus 1, Ortofon MC Anna, Ortofon MC A90

Digital source: MSB Reference DAC, Soulution 760, Berkeley Alpha DAC 2

Cable and interconnect: CrystalConnect Art Series Da Vinci, Crystal Cable Ultimate Dream, Synergistic Research SRX, Ansuz Acoustics Diamond

Power cords: CrystalConnect Art Series Da Vinci, Crystal Cable Ultimate Dream, Synergistic Research SRX, Ansuz Acoustics Diamond

Power conditioner: AudioQuest Niagara 5000 (two), Synergistic Research Galileo UEF, Ansuz Acoustics DTC, Technical Brain

Support systems: Critical Mass Systems MAXXUM and QXK equipment racks and amp stands and Center Stage^2M footers

Room Treatments: Stein Music H2 Harmonizer system, Synergistic Research UEF Acoustic Panels/Atmosphere XL4/UEF Acoustic Dot system, Synergistic Research ART system, Shakti Hallographs (6), Zanden Acoustic panels, A/V Room Services Metu acoustic panels and traps, ASC Tube Traps

Accessories: DS Audio ION-001, SteinMusic Pi Carbon Signature record mat, Symposium Isis and Ultra equipment platforms, Symposium Rollerblocks and Fat Padz, Walker Prologue Reference equipment and amp stands, Walker Valid Points and Resonance Control discs, Clearaudio Double Matrix Professional Sonic record cleaner, Synergistic Research RED Quantum fuses, HiFi-Tuning silver/gold fuses