[kennyt]

That looks to be a firewire connection, which can do what you say, but why would you want a great player like the Esoteric (I own one of theirs myself) and use it only as a transport? It will be really tough to find a pre/pro with better sounding DAC's, and none of those I am aware of offer firewire. This is something I see on mid-fi pieces, I think the Denon AVP has this, but I wouldn't use it's DAC's over the Esoterics!