or, what is the difference between ESP and Exact Actuation?

I've been dreaming of both converting my main ride to a 1x9 and being strong enough to rock the Front Range climbs without a granny years before SRAM debuted its 2x10 system. I've been fairly successful at avoiding shifting out of the middle, but that granny does occasionally pay its own way.

I went to a SRAM demo day a couple of months ago at Golden Bike Shop where they were demoing a bunch of brands of bikes all set up with XX and X.0 2x10 kit.