SONY CDP-XA3ES

Commentary

ES series CD player which adopts current pulse D/A conversion system.

The digital filter is equipped with a newly developed full feed-forward digital filter.
In the full-feed-forward digital filter, an FF (full-feed-forward) arithmetic block is provided to transmit data that had been truncated due to the limitation of arithmetic capability in the conventional method. This enables extremely precise musical expression and eliminates the maximum quantization noise in the audible band caused by data truncation, thereby greatly improving signal quality, especially at small levels.

The D/A converter is equipped with a current pulse D/A converter.
The current pulse D/A converter uses a current instead of a voltage to express the pulse, eliminating the effect of voltage fluctuations in principle. Moreover, it is less affected by noise from the arithmetic circuit, so it achieves a significant improvement in sound quality.

The complimentary service PLM method is used. Among the four outputs of the pulse D/A converter, two outputs of the PLM waves, which have a complementary relationship with each other, are differentially synthesized to reproduce an output waveform with less harmonic distortion.

The servo circuit is equipped with a high-precision digital servo.
This circuit uses a high sampling rate A/D and D/A converter to achieve servocontrol that better reflects the disc condition.

The analog low-pass filter uses an active-type Cowell low-pass filter with excellent group delay characteristics suppress the generation of wide-area noise.

The power supply uses an R-core transformer with excellent electromagnetic characteristics and very little magnetic flux leakage.

FB chassis is used for the chassis structure.
In this structure, the entire chassis is firmly joined by the outer frame and beams connecting the front and rear, ensuring rigidity and improving vibration resistance.

A center mechanical mount system is adopted, and the mechanical deck is placed in the center of the chassis to minimize the rotational moment applied to the chassis and improve stability against vibration.

Newly developed eccentric insulator is used for the leg part.
In this insulator, by offsetting the screw fixing position from the center, the effect of mutually canceling the vibration entering from the outer circumference of the insulator is obtained.

A newly developed static lighting type fluorescent display tube is adopted for the display, and by using a display with less switching, vibration and noise from the display tube are suppressed.

The Custom Edit function allows you to perform peak search (remote control only), time edit, just edit, program edit, time fade, manual fader (remote control only) and variable fade.

It has a custom file function and provides custom index and delete bank functions.

Features such as Delete Play, Shuffle, Delete Shuffle, 3-way Music Scan (remote control only), Auto Space (remote control only), Timer Play, 8-mode repeat, and Index Search (remote control only) are provided.

Equipped with an optical digital output.

Equipped with two analog outputs, fixed and variable, with gold-plated terminals.

Equipped with headphone port with lineout linked volume that can also be operated from remote control.

The black model of CDP-XA3ES was released in 1994, and the gold model was released the next year.

Wireless remote control is included.

Model Rating

Type	CD Player
D/A converter	Current pulse D/A converter
Digital filter	Full-feed digital filter
Frequency characteristic	2 Hz to 20 kHz ± 0.3 dB
Total harmonic distortion factor	0.0018% or less (EIAJ)
Signal-to-noise ratio	118 dB or more (EIAJ)
Dynamic range	100 dB or more (EIAJ)
Wow and flutter	Below the measurement limit (± 0.001% W. peak) (EIAJ)
Output level	Fixed : 2 Vrms Variable : 2 Vrms to 0 V
Digital output	Optical : -18dBm (emission wavelength 660 nm)
Headphone output level	28 mw (32 Ω)
Power supply voltage	100 VAC, 50Hz/60Hz
Power consumption	17W
External dimensions	Width 430x Height 125x Depth 345 mm
Weight	Approx. 6.6 kg
Attachment	Wireless Remote Control RM-D921