My Long List of Amplifiers and My Personal Review of Each!
So I have been in a long journey looking to find the best amplifiers for my martin logan montis. As you know, the match between an amplifier and speakers has to be a good "marriage" and needs to be blend exquisitely. Right now, I think I might have found the best sounding amplifier for martin logan. I have gone through approximately 34-36 amplifiers in the past 12 months. Some of these are:
Bryston ST, SST, SST2 series NAD M25 PARASOUND HALO PARASOUND CLASSIC KRELL TAS KRELL KAV 500 KRELL CHORUS ROTEL RMB 1095 CLASSE CT 5300 CLASSE CA 2200 CLASSE CA 5200 MCINTOSH MC 205 CARY AUDIO CINEMA 7 OUTLAW AUDIO 755 LEXICON RX7 PASS LABS XA 30.8 BUTLER AUDIO 5150 ATI SIGNATURE SERIES 6005
With all that said, the amplifiers I mentioned above are the ones that in my opinion are worth mentioning. To make a long story short, there is NO 5 CHANNEL POWER AMP that sounds as good as a 3ch and 2ch amplifier combination. i have done both experiments and the truth is that YOU DO lose details and more channel separation,etc when you select a 5 channel power amplifier of any manufacturer. My recollection of what each amp sounded like is as follows:
ATI SIGNATURE SERIES 6005 (great power and amazing soundstage. Very low noise floor, BUT this amplifiers NEEDS TO BE cranked up in order to fully enjoy it. If you like listening at low volume levels or somewhat moderate, you are wasting your time here. This amp won’t sound any different than many other brands out there at this volume. The bass is great, good highs although they are a bit bright for my taste)
NAD M25 (very smooth, powerful, but somewhat thin sounding as far as bass goes) Bryston sst2(detailed, good soundstage, good power, but can be a little forward with certain speakers which could make them ear fatiguing at loud volumes)
Krell (fast sounding, nice bass attack, nice highs, but some detail does get lost with certain speakers)
rotel (good amp for the money, but too bright in my opinion)
cary audio (good sound overall, very musical, but it didn’t have enough oomph)
parasound halo (good detail, great bass, but it still holds back some background detail that i can hear in others)
lexicon (very laid back and smooth. huge power, but if you like more detail or crisper highs, this amp will disappoint you)
McIntosh mc205 (probably the worst multichannel amp given its price point. it was too thin sounding, had detail but lacked bass.
butler audio (good amplifier. very warm and smooth sweet sounding. i think for the money, this is a better amp than the parasound a51)
pass labs (very VERY musical with excellent bass control. You can listen to this for hours and hours without getting ear fatigue. however, it DOES NOT do well in home theater applications if all you have is a 2 channel set up for movies. The midrange gets somewhat "muddy" or very weak sounding that you find yourself trying to turn it up.
classe audio (best amplifier for multi channel applications. i simply COULDNT FIND a better multi channel amplifier PERIOD. IT has amazing smoothness, amazing power and good bass control although i would say krell has much better bass control)
Update: The reviews above were done in January 2015. Below is my newest update as of October 2016:
PS AUDIO BHK 300 MONOBLOCKS: Amazing amps. Tons of detail and really amazing midrange. the bass is amazing too, but the one thing i will say is that those of you with speakers efficiency of 87db and below you will not have all the "loudness" that you may want from time to time. These amps go into protection mode when using a speaker such as the Salon, but only at very loud levels. Maybe 97db and above. If you don’t listen to extreme crazy levels, these amps will please you in every way.
Plinius Odeon 7 channel amp: This is THE BEST multichannel amp i have ever owned. Far , but FAR SUPERIOR to any other multichannel amp i have owned. In my opinion it destroyed all of the multichannel amps i mentioned above and below. The Odeon is an amp that is in a different tier group and it is in a league of its own. Amazing bass, treble and it made my center channel sound more articulate than ever before. The voices where never scrambled with the action scenes. It just separated everything very nicely.
Theta Dreadnaught D: Good detailed amp. Looks very elegant, has a pleasant sound, but i found it a tad too bright for my taste. I thought it was also somewhat "thin" sounding lacking body to the music. could be that it is because it is class d?
Krell Duo 300: Good amp. Nice and detailed with enough power to handle most speakers out there. I found that it does have a very nice "3d" sound through my electrostatics. Nothing to fault here on this amp. Mark Levinson 532H: Great 2 channel amp. Lots of detail, amazing midrange which is what Mark Levinson is known for. It sounds very holographic and will please those of you looking for more detail and a better midrange. As far as bass, it is there, but it is not going to give you the slam of a pass labs 350.5 or JC1s for example. It is great for those that appreciate classical music, instrumental, etc, but not those of you who love tons of deep bass.
It is articulate sounding too Krell 7200: Plenty of detail and enough power for most people. i found that my rear speakers contained more information after installed this amp. One thing that i hated is that you must use xlr cables with this amp or else you lose most of its sound performance when using RCA’s.
Krell 402e: Great amp. Very powerful and will handle any speaker you wish. Power is incredible and with great detail. That said, i didn’t get all the bass that most reviewers mentioned. I thought it was "ok" in regards to bass. It was there, but it didn’t slam me to my listening chair.
Bryston 4B3: Good amp with a complete sound. I think this amp is more laid back than the SST2 version. I think those of you who found the SST2 version of this amp a little too forward with your speakers will definitely benefit from this amp’s warmth. Bryston has gone towards the "warm" side in my opinion with their new SST3 series. As always, they are built like tanks. I wouldn’t call this amp tube-like, but rather closer to what the classe audio delta 2 series sound like which is on the warm side of things.
Parasound JC1s: Good powerful amps. Amazing low end punch (far superior bass than the 402e). This amp is the amp that i consider complete from top to bottom in regards to sound. Nothing is lacking other than perhaps a nicer chassis. Parasound needs to rework their external appearance when they introduce new amps. This amp would sell much more if it had a revised external appearance because the sound is a great bang for the money. It made my 800 Nautilus scream and slam. Again, amazing low end punch.
Simaudio W7: Good detailed amp. This amp reminds me a lot of the Mark Levinson 532h. Great detail and very articulate. I think this amp will go well with bookshelves that are ported in order to compensate for what it lacks when it comes to the bass. That doesn’t mean it has no bass, but when it is no Parasound JC1 either. Pass labs 350.5: Wow, where do i begin? maybe my first time around with the xa30.8 wasn’t as special as it was with this monster 350.5. It is just SPECTACULAR sounding with my electrostatics. The bass was THE BEST BASS i have ever heard from ANY amp period. The only amp that comes close would be the jC1s. It made me check my settings to make sure the bass was not boosted and kept making my jaw drop each time i heard it. It totally destroyed the krell 402e in every regard. The krell sounded too "flat" when compared to this amp. This amp had amazing mirange with great detail up top. In my opinion, this amp is the best bang for the money. i loved this amp so much that i ended up buying the amp that follows below.
Pass labs 250.8: What can i say here. This is THE BEST STEREO AMP i have ever heard. This amp destroys all the amps i have listed above today to include the pass labs 350.5. It is a refined 350.5 amp. It has more 3d sound which is something the 350.5 lacked. It has a level of detail that i really have never experienced before and the bass was amazing as well. I really thought it was the most complete power amplifier i have ever heard HANDS DOWN. To me, this is a benchmark of an amplifier. This is the amp that others should be judged by. NOTHING is lacking and right now it is the #1 amplifier that i have ever owned.
My current amps are Mcintosh MC601s: i decided to give these 601s a try and they don’t disappoint. They have great detail, HUGE soundstage, MASSIVE power and great midrange/highs. The bass is great, but it is no pass labs 250.8 or 350.5. As far as looks, these are the best looking amps i have ever owned. No contest there. i gotta be honest with you all, i never bought mcintosh monos before because i wasn’t really "wowed" by the mc452, but it could have been also because at that time i was using a processor as a preamp which i no longer do. Today, i own the Mcintosh C1100 2 chassis tube preamp which sounds unbelievable. All the amps i just described above have been amps that i auditioned with the C1100 as a preamp. The MC601s sound great without a doubt, but i will say that if you are looking for THE BEST sound for the money, these would not be it. However, Mcintosh remains UNMATCHED when it comes to looks and also resale value. Every other amp above depreciates much faster than Mcintosh.
That said, my future purchase (when i can find a steal of a deal) will be the Pass labs 350.8. I am tempted to make a preliminary statement which is that i feel this amp could be THE BEST stereo amp under 30k dollars. Again, i will be able to say more and confirm once i own it. I hope this update can help you all in your buying decisions!
This morning i have been listening to the boulder 2010 and DCS Vivaldi, but i have added the ALPHA NR SHUNYATA PC and Cardas Clear Audio XLR. Once again, the Boulder 2010 took command of the speakers with a tremendous amount of fullness and control throughout the entire frequency range. It just totally grabs the amps and controls them like if they were puppets. The sheer musicality is intoxicating. That said, the DCS dac completely morphed with the cables i added. It now has more musicality, delicacy, tonality than before. That said, it is not as musical as the boulder is with any source you connect to it.
So i think i have identified that both components have a sweetspot:
Boulder 2010: If you have hard to drive speakers and your amplifiers ARE NOT exactly at the top of the tier groups such as constellation centaur, Pass labs xs300s, Momentum m400s, etc then YOU NEED this preamp. It will make a decent amplifier sound MUCH MUCH BETTER. If you bring your friends over and want them to be like HOLY SH!T then just crank up the volume and that will be it.
DCS Vivaldi (as preamp): It is ultra high resolution, unforgiving at times, sounds amazing at low - moderate volumes, but it requires an amplifier’s right hand to help it deliver a more musical presentation. Think of Class A Design, Sweet sounding amps such as constellation, Luxman, etc. This piece by itself won’t do the trick just like the boulder 2010 would. This Dac needs your cooperation with better cables, amps, speaker cables in order to really reward you. If you are a sucker for low volume detail, this would do the trick as a preamp as long as you invest more money in other parts of your system.
Right now, it is decision time for me. i don’t know if i will move in the direction of the full DCS set up (minus cd player) and just work with other cables in order to create magic at low to moderate volume levels (which by the way there is no guarantee i will achieve it) or if i want to just keep being impressed with the boulder by putting the pedal to the metal when i listen to music through it. Time will tell ...
I only have the Rossini with Clock, which has an up sampler built in. At least in my testing, it’s the up sampler that added that really smooth, organic sound. The clock is pretty great too, especially for taking some of that digital edge off. Not sure you can really go wrong, but my suspicion is you’d hear a bigger difference with the up sampler.
WC, I heard the biggest difference when the Upsampler was added but dCS’ National Sales Manager John Quick would tell you the clock is the most critical component in the stack to eliminate timing errors and jitter. Eliminating timing errors and jitter does improve the sound and will remove the digital edge you are currently hearing that is causing listener fatigue. The Upsampler expands the great sound you are currently hearing from the Vivaldi DAC to give you greater detail and transparency, bigger and more 3-Dimensional soundstage and more insight into the performance. I bought my DAC and Clock together and then added the Upsampler. Adding the Upsampler will also give you the ability to stream Tidal, Spotify, Quboz, etc. - although I don’t find their streamer to be as good as what I get from my Innuos Statement. Tough call
You said "I am still contemplating buying nordost Odin 2 PC but I am also thinking of getting the upsampler for the Vivaldi. I also haven't forgotten about the music server". If you get an upsampler, you will have access to the Mosiac app, which uses the upsampler as a server. So you can kill two birds with one stone. I have heard it used as a sampler in the Vivaldi stack but have not compared it to say, a W20SE.
Focus on the clocking - it yields material benefits by adding the Vivaldi Master Clock.. quality BNC cables to carry these signals .. and a reference 10Mhz clock ( pick your investment level .. from the reasonable mutec or cybershaft through the ch precision T1 to the stute abendrot at 40k usd)
it annoys me no end but quality bnc clock cables ( in my case chord music) made a non trivial augment ... an experience echoed by jfrech and microstrip ( think they both use transparent opus) on whatsbestforum...
Further in my experience the Upsampler running AES ....even when buttressed by top end cables ( eg 20 k gbp worth thereof) is a wash versus a well fettled server feeding the Vivaldi DAC via USB
Like I said before and the guy reiterated above CYBERSHAFT or MUTEC REF 10 Clock. The Clock's can be used with any Esoteric or DCS Spinner unlike the Upsampler. Why get stuck with something that only works with 1 brand?
I’m not clear on how the Mutec clock works directly with the dCS. I tried reading a bit and gave up. The dCS only has a world clock input which is not what the Mutec is giving.
Good point. This Monday they are bringing me the dcs clock and the upsampler as well as a nordost pc Odin 2. I'll be able to hear all together as a group and then we will do piece by piece to see what contributes the most to sound improvement.
Ok so I have decided to replace my Wireworld Platinum 8 interconnect with Cardas clear beyond. I think it helps my dcs dac sound more relaxed and musical, easier for me to work with the dac. I didn't think I'd ever replace it but it's time.
Mutec is the 2nd choice anyway behind Cybershaft. BNC Cable should be all you need to connect to DCS or Esoteric. As stated before there is PLENTY of people with hands on Experience comparing a Cybershaft to one of the Various Esoteric Standalone Clocks....its not even a fight at 1/3 or less of the cost. Go to Audioafficiondo and look at the Esoteric Forum. Ignore at your own peril/expense and keep chasing your tail.
The Vivaldi Clock provides two signals for Word clock sync / lock across the stack ... one at 44.1kHz the other at 48 kHz .. these are carried on two separate BNC cables to two independent inputs on the DAC and Upsampler ( labelled word clock input) and for the transport just the 44.1kHz
the Vivaldi Clock also accepts an external reference clock signal at 10 MHz on a dedicated 75ohm BNC convector .. locking to this “ more accurate “ reference to further reduce drift and jitter
WC, Impressive thread! Thanks for sharing all your experiences. Would appreciate your thoughts on the Luxman c900u/m900u combo. I currently have an ARC Ref 6 pre with Levinson 33H amps driving Wilson Sasha version 1 speakers but considering the Luxman combo. Thanks. Vito
@riaa not sure why you needed to paste that here. No one argued that the Mutec couldn’t be used with the Vivaldi system, but as far as I can tell you need the Master Clock first, which @whitecamaross does not yet have.
The mutec ref 10 is a 10mhz master clock, it does not output a word clock signal. To use it with a DCS dac you need something to provide the word clock. You can use the Mutec mc3+ to do this or the Vivaldi clock.
Esoteric gear will take the 10mhz clock signal directly but uses a 50ohm BNC connector. The mutec ref 10 has both 75 ohm and 50 ohm connectors for this reason.
What @kstaken said. The Mutec alone will not go straight into the dCS DAC. It only takes world clock. Up to you if you want to stick to dCS for that. I think most Vivaldi (and Rossini) owners use the dCS one.
Why did I post gear that works with Mutec....I guess I felt like annoying you and proving you wrong...mission accomplished. Clearly its not the 1 box solution like it is with Esoteric but it still can be used with DCS. You inferred in your prior comment...and WCSS took it that way...they were totally incompatible.
So DCS is sticking its customers with an entire extra box to sell instead of putting the entire clock function into 1 box. Brilliant marketing scheme.
So this review of the Sasha DAW just came out yesterday. It’s insane that they freaking use a MacBook to stream music !! These dudes are supposed to be the best people out there reviewing stuff !!! How is this possible ? They are supposed to be experts and do this for a living. Why the hell don’t they use a real music renderer ?? This is crazy. With all their connections and free stuff they get, you mean to tell me they use a laptop ? Look at the page of the associated components on this review
No panic here. There’s never panic when you own something outright and knowing you have plan B in the event that it doesn’t work out. I am always prepared when I venture into new components. Also, let’s not forget that we are still talking about Esoteric and DCS which are highly regarded. I’d be in panic mode if I weren’t with them though :) but having them puts me at ease. Do you see any listed here ? Nope.. market is dry meaning someone is out there fishing for either one. It isn’t rocket science. Both components fly the moment they show up on the used market. They are just very desired by both camps. At this level , it’s not about buying audio but rather investing in audio. You don’t buy stock that nobody buys. You stick to Apple, Disney , Microsoft stock, etc and stay away from the small timers. However , if there’s deep DEEP pockets then sure you can buy any weird name brands out there and not worry that you’ll take a "Mike Tyson " punch in the gut when you sell. You have any idea how many people have told me to buy things here before ? Think Rane, GT Audio, that other 3k preamp I was told to buy , etc etc. The messed up part about this is that all these recommendations are often times by those who haven’t owned any of these and so they want me to buy , spend my money and give people my input so they know if it sinks or swims. I can’t buy everything that is recommended but I would be glad to send a shipping label to anyone who preaches anything at all so they can send me that component they believe in so I can review it ? How's that ?
A couple pages back there was some discussion about the Benchmark LA4/AHB2 vs. the Luxman C900U/M900U. I don’t really participate in these forums but this is something I thought I might be able to share some experience on as I’ve owned both of these at the same time. I still own the Benchmark pieces along with the C900U.
When it comes to the Benchmark gear the word you often hear mentioned is "transparency" and this is 100% true. The Benchmark gear is by far the most transparent gear I’ve heard. It’s impossible to describe the sound of the gear because to a huge extent the gear it self simply doesn’t have a sound, at least not one that I can discern. The sound is simply the sound of the source component and recording. If the recording is warm you get warm, if the recording is cold and sterile that’s what it will give you. It the soundstage is big it will be big, if it’s narrow, shallow or deep ... yep all there ... if the information is in the recording. For me this quality is absolutely intoxicating but a lot of audiophiles seem to not like it.
The down side of this is that you have to have everything aligned just right or it won’t sound right. The gear won’t hide flaws like using a laptop via USB into a DAC with a crap USB interface. If you take that and feed it through the Benchmark chain, guess what? The Benchmark chain will sound awful. It gives you what you give it and doesn’t try to editorialize and "fix" things.
The Luxman gear to me is very different. The M900U amp in particular is very colored to me. It puts a warm and artificially large sound on everything. This might be described as making the soundstage bigger and putting meat on the bones of the performers but to me it sounds wrong and has the quality of homogenizing the sound. In my experience a lot of audiophiles love this quality but I personally do not, hence the reason I no longer have the amp.
The Luxman preamp is more transparent than the amp but not on the level of the Benchmark and it has a subtle quality that I call fake refinement. This is hard to describe but I perceive it as a slight softening of transients and a lengthening of decay trails in a way that makes things sound more "refined". This sounds very good but to me this is also just homogenizing the sound. It’s a sound imposed by the gear that’s not in the recording. Again a lot of audiophiles will prefer this because it does sound very good but for me even though I still own the C900U it’s just sitting on the shelf unused.
I haven’t put the Benchmark gear up against anything at the $30K+ level in my system but I’ve had a lot of gear up to the $20K level through my system and for me the Benchmark just gets out of the way of the music in a way that everything else I’ve tried fails.
To @whitecameross I realize the Benchmark stuff isn’t even close to the price level that you’re playing with, hopefully my thoughts aren’t unwelcome since other people had been asking about this.
BTW, for speakers I have Martin Logan CLX Art and ATC SCM40 which are both highly transparent transducers and with the Benchmark gear either combo is simply ... intoxicating.
Thanks for the feedback. I appreciate and respect your input here since you own both pieces so I have no reason to doubt your findings. I will have to agree that the luxman gear isn’t totally transparent because it sounds awesome with everything you throw at it which we all know isn’t the case with most recordings. That said , the same could be said for cardas clear beyond xlr. They make things sound more musical and engaging which ends up in long listening sessions. I think the key here is what are we trying to do ? Do we want to listen for long hours and enjoy the presentation the way the artist wanted us to or the way the manufacturer of the components wants ? It comes down to picking "your poison " because at the end of the day you have to decide what you want. I tried components that were neutral and I couldn’t wait to get off the couch. Magico is suposed to be a neutral speaker that measures extremely well on the bench, but does this mean you’ll end up listening until 3am? Some say that they are cold, soul-less speakers that don’t make you tap your feet. For me it is really about the long listening sessions. It is about having a system that makes me look forward to come home and be totally in love with what it does. I have an acquaintance that wants nothing but the facts from the components and that’s fine but often times I noticed that I can’t sit next to him for long hours because I lose interest in the presentation. I can also think of it in terms of cars. I would love to own a Dodge Viper ACR so I can drive it on the weekends and feel the incredible connection to the road, the pure raw power , the lack of air conditioning that makes me feel closer to a real race car. However, do I want to drive that car to Orlando to go to Disney for a 6 hour round trip? Most likely i would do it once and that’s it but I’m sure the sweating, my head hurting from the exhaust notes and having to drive with the windows down plus the lack of comfort would make me not want to do it again. Yes it’s probably an insane ride but it is for quick trips. Audio is really no different. Now, the hard thing to do is to have a combination of both; a system with transparency but with musicality. Thats the hardest thing to have in the right proportions and perhaps what I am after.
For me there is a difference between neutral and transparent. Neutral is necessary but not sufficient for transparency. I've heard many components that are considered neutral that don't even come close to being transparent. Neutral is just about frequency response while transparency requires clean frequency response plus immense resolution, dynamics and an absence of noise that many so called neutral components just don't have.
This Benchmark stuff has been completely surprising to me, at first I was highly skeptical that it could really be that good but I bought an AHB2 for the hell of it since it's not that expensive and once it hit my system the Luxman M900U saw almost no further usage. The Benchmark was vastly superior based on what I look for in audio. For me, nothing is as engaging as actual transparency to the recording and being able to dig so deep into recordings keeps me glued to the listening chair to an unhealthy degree.
It's definitely preference though as the person that ended up with my M900U bought a used AHB2, tried it, preferred the M900U and sold the AHB2 to me so I could run two as monos. Shrug.
Obviously Kstaken doesn’t listen to Classic Rock or other poorly recorded music. Must be a Pipe and Slippers kinda guy musically speaking...which is fine. To each his own.
I have my suspicions that Viber either cloned himself or changed his Audiogon name.
Wflm.....that Vivaldi thread is 5 - 6 years old.
I am not telling anybody what to buy. I will tell anybody if you don't maximize the capabilities of what you already have (within reason) your just spinning your wheels/chasing your tail.
I thought the Kstaken review was very well done. Honest, not preachy, admissive of likely a minority opinion but still true and committed to it, and most importantly borne of an actual head to head based on real (not imagined or theorized) ownership. Plus well written, which I appreciate.
Sounds like that benchmark could hit the mark for a segment of consumers and punches above its class. Great to know even if main thrust of thread is to higher end offerings.
No way that was Viber rechristened as Kstacken, not possible, and I trust Kstacken won’t post pages every fifth post hereafter beating us over the head if we don’t agree with his/her opinion. For the record, that was to draw a comparison; I hope Kstacken does post a lot more.
Viber is on a little break but I’m sure he’ll be back ... Although even in his absence he was dismissively backhanded by WC again just now for being a streetcorner pusher of Rane, GT, .... That’s probably not fair to GT but still made me chuckle......ah, good times.... If we’re taking requests, I’m still hoping for Alexx and top shelf ARC amp/pre but I’m patient and I think WC will eventually pass thru that town ....
"Wflm.....that Vivaldi thread is 5 - 6 years old." Ahh...the post I cited was from this morning (4.30am London)....and the poster Al.M visited Goodwins yesterday....that be the experience I reference.
I was joking about you know who. (Dont want to give him too much press)
The Benchmark usually receives stellar reviews/comments. Kal Rubinson (Multi Channel reviewer for Stereophile) runs 3 of them in his 5.1 setup. He raves about them....but he listens to classical music primarily. When people comment about what they are hearing on their gear its important (to me anyway) to actually know WHAT kinda music they are listening to. Most people bypass that completely. Im sure Diana Krall sounds much better on those Benchmarks than Ozzy would.
if anyone is masquerading as you know who it’s techno (no offense techno if you are not the man under the mask at the end of a Scooby episode, hahaha.)
Post made purely in jest.
(But you’d have gotten away with it if not for those pesky kids!!!!)
@riaa. Are you somewhat in agreement with what I said above about the fact that it's about picking your poison? I don't argue that this preamp being spoken about here might be an excellent amp for the money but to your earlier point, if you can't put it through the motions because you blast ac/dc , Ozzy, Lynyrd Skynyrd, etc then ultimate transparency may not be what is important in this case.
My favorite aspect to the journey is that, from what I can tell from WC’s descriptions (and I’ve read whole thread), I share the same preferences as to sound quality that he does. So I don’t need to recalibrate his conclusions to fit my worldview. If he liked it, I figure I probably will and similarly if he didn’t. Of course that won’t be true for everyone.
That is probably also why I take such offense when others try to spin WC’s conclusions to fit a fanciful narrative that they would prefer, but which clouds WC’s output with euphonic overlays.
WCSS, I am on board with your take. Transparency/Clarity would be great and appreciated on about 5% of what I listen to. All the singer/songwriter stuff (Lightfoot, Fogelberg, J. Browne, Zevon etc)....the rest I prefer to hear it Masked, Euphonic, blah blah blah....whatever makes those subpar masterings sound better. Thank God some of what I listened to in the 70's is finally getting "cleaned up" and re-released. Should have happened 20 years ago.
I think the HARDEST thing for most people to realize is that the perfect system for ALL music genres does not exist. I could build something that i feel is excellent with what i listen to and then you walk through the door with your CDs and you are disappointed with what you hear. What i do feel is that a combination of transparency, neutrality, musicality is extremely difficult to achieve. Maybe one day i will try this Benchmark preamp and see what how it interacts with my other components. Constellation, Luxman, Dag are 3 outstanding brands that can be accused of not being completely transparent, but boy oh boy do they make you sit and listen for hours and hours. I can't knock people who love full clarity, transparency and neutrality though, but I just hate to have to constantly be turning the volume up and down because i hate the brightness, harshness or nastiness that some recordings have. This leads me to also understand that this could be very well the reason why i might be preferring soft dome tweeters a little more than Beryllium (but this does not mean i could not go back to Beryllium). Soft dome, just like ribbon tweeters tend to not agitate my ears as quick as Beryllium does. With that said, are those of you who love transparency in your components using electrostatics? (i know Kstaken is) because if you are all about "full disclosure" in terms of the sound quality you prefer, then i am assuming you feel the same about your speakers and we all know electrostatics pretty much are at the top in that regard.
Ya, it’s so true. I love prime rib, and I insist it is “the best.” You love lobster and no matter how many times I tell you prime rib is better and you tell me lobster is better, we ain’t changing each other’s minds.
Then that weirdo over there keeps saying tofu and brussel sprouts are better than both prime rib and lobster, and dammit, even though they’re crazy, they’re still correct as to themselves and their messed up view.
But the hobby menu is full featured enough to serve all tastes! Thankfully for me, this thread’s specialty is prime rib!!
kstaken, Thanks for both of your well-written posts, well said. In addition, I find that another problem with going for complementary sonic colorations is that although they may appear to match, they don't quite. For analogies, a pick-me-up from strong coffee won't cure a hangover from too much alcohol. If you want the road feel of a sports car, don't sit on plush pillows. When I tried the warm Classe D200, I couldn't get the snap of my Bryston 2.5B SST2 by fiddling with my EQ. This is why going for transparency actually makes things easier--you can concentrate on upgrades of sources, speakers, etc. I think WC's situation is that his particular music recordings are artificially processed and unpleasant to an extent, so he naturally seeks warmth for some of them. Listeners to more naturally recorded classical music and some jazz can feel more comfortable with transparency.
Incidentally, I almost bought the Benchmark AHB2 because it sounded extremely close to my Bryston. The Benchmark specs indicated that it should work to provide higher power and more current than my Bryston does, but in practice it shut down. I don't know why, and too bad. If you have speakers with high impedance, then bridged AHB2 gives high power and purity for only $6000 retail, although I couldn't test this on my very low impedance stats.
Thanks for the correction Riaa. As far as the amp shutting down, that might be an issue here because the Alexia 1s are pigs when it comes to power. I love how much they draw me into the music even though they aren’t perfect and I wish they did some other things better but those other things they don’t do are not really of much importance to me. Again, soundstage width, height, control ,musicality and clarity are all at the top of my list. Everything else such as superb transparency and neutrality aren’t as important but this doesn't mean I don't care about them. I still need some of those traits "sprinkled " somewhere in there.
@riaa you’re right I don’t primarily listen to classic rock and if I did I would probably choose tubes and a big bass heavy speaker. But one of the big reasons that I appreciate transparency so much is because I don’t listen to a narrow range of music and the system needs to handle whatever I choose to throw at it.
For me that works best when the system does as much as it can to simply get out of the way. The only time this really fails for me is on some horribly crushed modern loudness war productions where nothing is really going to help.
Classic rock is never really a problem, but the presentation is definitely different and I 100% get why that won’t work for everyone. For me ... I can go from a Mahler symphony to Billie Eilish to Love to Branford Marsalis to Portishead and finish with Iron Maiden and it all works fantastically.
As I write this I’m listening to Robert Johnson and if you’ve heard these you know the transfers from 78s of these 1930s recordings can be iffy. But the resolution of this chain is so high that it gives you everything these ancient recording have to give and for me being able to connect to such influential music on this level is just magical.
Anyway, I’m not really trying to advocate for anything. Just sharing my thoughts after lurking on this thread for what seems like forever.
I was actually worried somebody might make a comparison to viber6 but I think he plays the violin whereas I play the banjo. Pipe and slippers ... nah.
As far as the Benchmark AHB2 shutting down, I have 2 running as bridged monos and with the Martin Logan CLX they've never flinched. I checked with Benchmark before trying this and they said there should be no problems even though they hadn't heard of anyone using them on the CLX and they were correct.
BTW, to clarify the AHB2 is the amp, the LA4 or HPA4 is the preamp. HPA4 just adds a headphone section and that's what I actually own that replaced my Luxman C900U.
kstaken, Your ML CLX are about 10 dB more efficient than my Audiostatic 240's. I use only the single panel of the 240's to get the best clarity although the bass is sacrificed. In addition, I use the Enigmacoustics tweeter in parallel with the 240's. With its 8 kHz setting, the impedance of the combo is very low, and who knows what the parallel phase relationships are. So I think the Benchmark AHB2 works for you mainly because of the 10 dB higher efficiency and simpler setup. I did appreciate the purity of the AHB2 at modest volumes, as well as the purity of the CLX.
BTW, the strumming of the banjo and guitar often produce exciting HF transients where the speed of the Benchmark and CLX are an asset.
Techno dude has cracked the case . This is nothing more than a dealer using someone to sell his wares . The pieces of the puzzle have been left for many months now .
Who proclaims something is the best he's ever heard one month and sell it the next with no new product declared better ? Some investigating I am sure will prove this . What's a close dealer to the ops location , someone close by see what this store has been selling and taking in for used equipment , I am sure it will be one and the same as the ops gear .
Transparent gear does not make you want to have short listening sessions , quite the opposite in reality . 100db listening sessions with distortion in the system is what will make for unpleasant sessions .
@whitecamaross I'm really interested in your comparison of Esoteric K1 and DCS Vivaldi. I'm currently evaluating if there are any wins in stepping up to that level on the digital side. I currently have a DCS Debussy along with the Mutec MC-3+ and Mutec Ref 10 master clock along with the Benchmark DAC3 and a Schiit Yggdrasil. I've been seriously considering either an Esoteric K-01xs or the Grandioso K1.
So far the only thing in that price range I've been able to bring in to my system has been the Nagra Tube DAC which is something you might actually like. It's fundamentally pretty transparent but it has a tube so adds just a hint of bloom which I actually found to be very well done. Not sure it will be for me but I felt it was a very good sounding piece.
@maplegrovemusic Yes man you got it all figured out. You got me running an operation where I make massive amounts of money which is allowing me to fly around the world every weekend. My 9-5pm is just because im bored at home so it's something to do. You figured it all out man !
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