Hi Eric,
yes, I bought it in the Netherlands. The seller wanted to sell both the 2000 pro and the 3000. In the end he was willing to sell me the transport only. Both units were serviced by Spectral a year and a half ago.
I had a very interesting audio session at a friend's place last week. The digital set-ups:
set 1. An Esoteric integrated player
set 2. A 3000 feeding my dCS Elgar Plus, and
set 3. a 2000 and 3000 combination with the spectralink
This was very, very interesting. You could describe the journey from set 1 to set 3 as: from very digital to very analog. Digital not used in a bad way but in a modern way: very resolving, highly transparant. The 2000/3000 set sounded exactly like Ack said: it did not sound modern anymore. HOWEVER Ack, damn....if musicallity is a valid definition in the high-end world, this combi was it! Liquid as hell. I think I am going to buy the 2000 as well, even if I am not going to use in in my present set-up. Set 2 was a bit in the middle: maybe not as transparant as the Esoteric but very musical. Having listened to the 3000 feeding the Elgar Plus, driving the 360s directly for 3 days now, moved the sound a bit more to the Esoteric. I could live with this for a very long time. However, I have not had a serious Spectral Pre in my system so this is something to try in the (near) future. My friend has the latest version of the 30SS. Will keep you posted.
Cheers, Wim