Thx to RudeWolf's first post about eBay I've managed to research a little more and turns out that this isn't a Japanese product but Chinese made it seems. The reason for the different pricing is the option for those who want to do a partial build (i.e. buy the the board but knock up their own transformer, own custom chassis, etc.). Or for the lazy like me, buy all the options and get them to assemble it. It seems that this Japanese distributor has his own chassis as the Chinese eBay one looks somewhat different.

Anyway, I've kinda ditched the idea of picking this up now.

I'd replace the power supply completely with a lab linear supply ASAP. Very good ones are available and quite cheap - the price would turn out the same.
As a bonus, this thing is logically designed, so you could trim it to 1/4th the size.

Other than the fact that ESS chips are underdocumented, it looks like standard pro stuff except for the electrolytic caps.
I mean, come on! Tantalum isn't *that* expensive. Heck, they should've used a supercap instead if that much filtering is desired.

Needs MOAR CAPS!

Haha that is the first thing I thought as well.  MOAR CAPS must equal better sound right??!!?