Actually if you go to the Peachtree website you can read about the existence of the large quantity (relatively speaking) of refurbs of the X-1. It's unrelated to a defect - it's a matter of a new feature being added after units had been released to dealers.
After releasing the Grand Integrated, Peachtree decided to add an XMOS chip to improve the sound quality out of the USB connector. Naturally, every dealer that had received Grand Integrateds already wanted to send them back to have the XMOS chip (Peachtree called the upgrade X-1) installed. Because those units were returned to Peachtree for the X-1 installation, technically they have to be called Refurbs. They were not actually sold to anyone, they were just returned to Peachtree to have the X-1 modification added. As you'll read on the Peachtree site, Peachtree themselves have some of those "refurbs" on hand, as for some dealers they saved time and inconvenience and just replaced dealer units with new X-1 units rather than make dealers wait for the mods to be installed. Not that there aren't some customer returns out in the market - every manufacturer has some percentage of returns - but in this particular case the refurb situation with Peachtree isn't an issue of a defect, it's a case of Peachtree wanting to add a new feature after they'd already released a large quantity of units onto the market, and those units being sent back to Peachtree for installation of the mod.
I took advantage of the current offer on the Peachtree site, and bought one at $2999. It arrived looking absolutely flawless, not a mark on it, and it works beautifully. Great DAC, truckload of power, and it sounds wonderful. And the build quality is superb - it's every bit as impressive and solid as my ARC integrated.
Visit the Peachtree site, go to "Integrated Amps", and then to "Grand Integrated X-1" and you'll see the details of the X-1 mod and the special offer price on "refurb" units that were sent back by dealers to have the XMOS chip installed.
