Peachtree GaN 1 Beta

I never expected everyone to like my Musetec 005. in fact, I may sell 1 of them to get the Lumin X1 (for streaming convenience and keeping the 2nd 005 in the office). I also use a Benchmark DAC3B that a lot of people dislike. Who cares, I know what I like.

The GAN1 does sound great in stock form with MY intended application, the RAAL SR1a earphones. The GAN1 is better than $30K of 2-channel gear WITH THE SR1a. I sold that $30K of gear but kept the Musetec 005 DAC.

What I am doing with the mods is based on my past experience with Ric and the Voyager 350 GAN he modded for me. Who knows what the result will be, but I am interested in finding out, because the Voyager mod was exceptional.

I got some pings from SR1a owners who are now also interested in the GAN1. The $1400 GAN1 is much better financially than spending a lot more like I had in the past.

With other speakers, my interest in using the GAN1 in not there since I have 2 other amps that work better in the intended usage. A CODA #16 (Livingroom) and Benchmark AHB2 (office).

Edit: I just bought the Lumin X1. Anyone need an Musetec 005?

The issue is that Ric is not simply sharing his thoughts, he is selling his services on a hobbyist forum and there is financial interest underlying his posts. This is very much a sales pitch not all that different from another vendor who doesn't get a lot of love on this forum. So some scrutiny in my opinion is justified.

When I buy new equipment, unless it's pre-owned, I need some guarantees to know if it will work for me based on my listening preferences. In most cases, I can go to a dealer and audition the equipment in person. Or I can purchase it from vendors with reasonable return policies. But, here we've been asked to just trust a seller's judgment with no objective proof or guarantees. I understand that no one is putting a gun on our heads to buy Ric's services, but if you're going to advertise your services for free on an otherwise hobbyist/non-professional forum then some investigation is justified. If you're asking me to spend my money with no guarantees, taking risk such as voiding warranties, proclaiming that your enhancements are better than the original design, etc. then you have to provide more data points other than "trust me!"

I do know this, I will never buy a integrated, preamplifier or amplifier that would require internal tweaks to make it sound good. Especially if the modifier cannot measure or validate the sudo engineering behind the mods.

When I built the motor in my 68 Z28 every modification was validated with dynamic testing and measurements through data acquisition. Same with my motorcycles. 

Risk reward, I am not letting some dude void my warranty, not some shade tree modifier of audio equipment. No matter how inexpensive this setup is. No fires in my house. 

@yyzsantabarbara , you like your Musetec DAC. And there were folks who quickly sold it, because it did not sound good to them. Point is - not everyone hears the same. As more and more people experience these amps, we will know a better picture. Only time will tell.

I do not get all the folks whose panties are in a knot because of what Ric says he is doing to the gear. If you do not agree do not buy it and try. I have 2 pieces of gear that I had modded. The LAS Voyager 359 GAN amp by Ric and my now over 20-year-old Sony SCD-1 SACD player. One of the best players EVER made. The mods on both took a good to great unit and made them exceptional. Now for those people who panties get too tight with mods, why not loosen it up and breathe.

With regards to people who are pooh poohing the comments on here, these amps can be a an "interesting" competitor. Hmm?

@ricevs Since you don't provide any measurable proof that your tweaks result in better SQ, do you provide some form of guarantee that a customer would like the outcome? Say, I send you a unit to be tweaked and when I get it back I either don't hear any appreciable difference, or perhaps it sounds worse to me. Would you be able return my money including the shipping cost?

@jetter

And I think that anyone implying that the vast majority of audio engineers, scientists and other professionals in the field do not listen to their creations as much or more as anyone else is truly moronic and not worthy of being printed. Yes, there always will be an outlier.

Well said. It would be funny if it wasn't such a despicable scam.
 

I would purchase anything that atmasphere sells without hesitation.

Insinuating that the design Ralph took years to create can be improved by applying a laundry list of mods sounds really off base.

And I think that anyone implying that the vast majority of audio engineers, scientists and other professionals in the field do not listen to their creations as much or more as anyone else is truly moronic and not worthy of being printed.  Yes, there always will be an outlier. 

Its very simple.....those of us that trust ourself and listen on our own.....know the truth.....those that just speak of science as truth.....and don't listen......do not know the truth.....end of story.  Everything else is just blah blah blah.

Trust your ears....you will know what works and does not work.

Do not trust what I say....or anyone else says.....only trust your own experience.

This is true self love....trusting yourself....loving and enjoying your own experience.  No one knows better than you......when you allow yourself to trust.

We are amazing.

I am amazed at how much I have learned about audio and about life this last year......tons of new things.....digital amps, Music Purifiers, Inverter power, using plastic (no metal) for speaker clamps, Bybee Claifiers....etc.  always more to explore and learn.....just as the soul learns to love more and more.....so the mind learns to open more and more to the possibilities.

@thespeakerdude 

Call me crazy.

Crazy is thinking that someone who makes a living selling dreams will ever wake up to reality.

This thread is dead. Mr Charming is up to his old tricks.

Always the go to fallacy: "people who criticize don’t listen"...just another deflection.

Who are you to decree that just because people trust science, logic, and reason rather than your self serving, self interested fairy tales, they don’t listen? Maybe many have and the issue is in fact that there is nothing to hear amongst the unsubstantiated, unproven-or should I say disproven?- claims you make (and make money of off)? Who are you tell everyone that your hack jobs will universally improve the sound of an amp? Even if your "tweaks" actually improved the performance of an amp, there are sure to be people who don’t think they improve the sound- tastes differ. Talk about fantasy...

It’s not slander to call out the truth. First, prove your "tweaks" actually do something other than degrade the performance of an amp, then prove that whatever you’ve done is universally accepted as an improvement. You can’t prove or verify your claims, yet you are a non-stop ad machine always sneaking in your services here on this hobbyist board, always spewing the same unsubstantiated claims. Audio is full of charlatans always ready to fleece the unknowledgeable and insecure. You might fool 90% of those on this forum but you won’t fool everyone.

Of course your disagree with Ralph- what could someone who actually designs and sells equipment possible know, compared to someone who makes a living off of other people's work, jumping on every new amp with fantastic claims of "improvement"? To actually think that some solder gun jockey could actually somehow know better than the designers of these products really is beyond the pale. Kind of like some 6th grade kid with a watch teaching Stephen Hawking about time...
 

You are right. I don’t listen to people who don’t know the difference between Class D and a digital amplifier. I don’t listen to people who make wild claims so obviously false. I don’t listen to people who post manifestos on the web filled with easily recognized errors.

I do listen to the many speaker designers, acoustic physicists, and EEs i work with who in total have many hundreds of years of audio work experience. I listen to our panels of experts listeners working in controlled conditions. I listen to my customers who include mixing, mastering and recording engineers, and even artists.

Call me crazy.

The lack of your knowledge is not shocking....it is a common trait amongst those that refuse to listen and think they know everything there is about audio by looking at meters and squiggles. Only about 10% of serious audiophiles believe like you ASR types......the other 90% actually think that cables, and line conditioners, capacitors, resistors, etc.....all make a sonic difference and those 90% know that the sonic difference is heard (and they hear it) but cannot be measured.  Why are you on a forum where you are the serious minority?  Do you just like being right?  Why would you comment about something that you have no interest in nor would you ever even try listening to it to see if it makes a difference?  What is your purpose here?  No one can learn anything from you because you do not listen.  "Just buy the stuff that measures the way we say is best".......is all you say.....over and over again.  Very sad......If feel sorry for you....you are missing out on so much goosebumps from discovering some free tweak that blows your mind.....really!!!....the universe is infinite.....you are infinite...exporation is fun.

My vote is with the guy who has built a Class D architecture from the ground up and "the other guy". I don’t place much faith in someone who does not know the difference between Class D and a digital PWM like amplifier.

@kuribo , fraud or charlatan may be a bit harsh. In result there may be no difference, but I believe the person in question faithfully believes what they believe though the lack of knowledge is obvious in the writing and the hubris is shocking to me personally. The best people I work with in audio are very confident but also very humble in their abilities. They would never think to make such claims.

If we make a change to a product and a difference can be heard by anyone, we can always measure a change. Always. Those best people I mentioned, they usually have a very good idea what it is before we have the measurements. It does require having measuring equipment.

It’s like Kenjit for amps! Ha. 

To call someone a fraud or charlatan without having any idea whether the persons information is true or not.....is slander. You have never listened to the things I have done so you have no actual knowledge.  Is this your mature? behavior?

@ricevs I didn't take @atmasphere comments as meaning there is no sound difference to different architecture. I thought he was saying they are much more advanced in "forecasting" what stuff sounds like and the ability to confirm that with testing and data and listening. I think you both are confirming the same thing? 

thanks to everyone for making this a very interesting thread, dolfan

I completely disagree with Ralph....and of course, the other guy....he he.

I can take any amplifier....including the Atmasphere class D amps and make them sound any way I want without touching the actual circuit......so it will still measure the same.  YOU CANNOT measure the sound of solder, wire, jacks....removing jacks, damping, wire directionality, capacitors, resistor brands, inductor brands, removing noise creating things like fuses and LEDs, adding exotic noise filters, etc, etc. into infinity.  I can hear ALL OF THESE THINGS and so can ANYONE else.....if they actually do serious listening tests on a tweaky system with an open mind. 

I have modified the super measuring Purifi amps and improved the sound tremendously.  Just read the review of my modified VTV amp on 10 audio and compare it with his review of the NAD C298 amp that he reviewed using the same modules......my amp sounds way better.

It is not "magic" that all these things sound different......it is just the way it is.  You can keep your head in the sand and pretend that all these things are just BS I am trying to sell you.......or you can believe your ears.  Lots manufacturers actually believe a lot of what I just posted.  They are constantly upgrading parts and execution because their ears tell them to.  Kef uses ordinary Chinese xover parts in their LS50 Meta......but uses serious xover parts in the Blade 2 Meta.....they use WBT input jacks, better wire, hard wired xovers, better resistors, capacitors and inductors.....every single thing in the Blade has been upgraded from the ordinary parts used in the way cheaper LS50.......they do this because it makes it sound better.....not for better bling....or so they can adverstise something that is not true.  What is really interesting is that Kef no longer shows off their super xover....like they did on the page for the original Blade.....they just say they updated the crossover more.......so they are not trying to leverage anything by using better SOUNDING parts.....except to make it sound better.  The most expensive Magico speakers use the more expensive and better sounding Mundorf parts.......the speakers do not measure better because of better SOUNDING parts.....they just sound better.  I could site hundreds of examples of complanies that tweak and use better sounding parts and offer varuious levels of product based on how much tweaking they add.

The art of audio....is just that......half engineering....and half listening to every single thing possible and putting it all together to give the best sound.  Measurements NEVER tell you all you want to know about the sound.  The first person to upgrade all the basic Chinese xover parts in their Mofi speaker with super sounding parts is going to have to scape their jaw off the floor after they listen to the upgraded speaker.....same with amps, preamps, DACs....whatever......measurements will only take you so far.  My modded GaN1 will sound way better than stock....yet it will still measure exactly the same.....I do NOTHING that would make it measure any different........this game is infinite.

Now, who wants the last word?  Can you guess?

Love you all beyond words.....you are all magnificent, magical and beautiful....forever and ever........

Measurements can tell you if there is a problem, but they can't tell you if the thing will sound good or not.

Well I’m no scientist. My Particle Physicist daughter has a Fellowship at CERN, so it’s in my genes/jeans.

I always thought the measure of good Amp design was how the thing sounded. Have I got it wrong?

I’m no psychologist either, but when I see a man so obsessed about an amplifier he’s never heard, my suspicion is he’s one of those audiofools who’s whole identity is built on his stack of $$$$$$$$ boxes & wires and is terrified by the thought some new fangled tech might sound as good at a fraction of the price.

That, or he just talks sh1te.

Sometimes you just can't explain why something works when the scientific mind says it shouldn't. I see Picasso and am dumfounded others see his stuff and marvel at it. Audio is like this.

@dolfan That was true in 1985 but measurement tech has advanced quite a lot since then as well as our understanding of how the ear/brain perceives sound. So we can now make measurements that relate directly to what we hear and if enough measurements are done we can forecast how the amp will sound. That certainly was not true 30-35 years ago, so a lot got ascribed to 'magic'.

I know there is science in amp design but there is also artistry in they way these designs are implemented. These two concepts of design almost never mesh. All the best audio designers are as much artists as they are scientists.

Sometimes you just can't explain why something works when the scientific mind says it shouldn't. I see Picasso and am dumfounded others see his stuff and marvel at it. Audio is like this. The market will tell us what consumers think.

Put on the Jazz Groove Radio station and smile folks.

Happy New Year, dolfan

@donnylovely 

There are much better amps and amp designers out there, like Hypex and Purifi, such that I don't need to design my own amp, I only need to understand and recognize superior design, technology, and value. You can either educate yourself or be at the mercy of ignorance and others. Somehow you don't seem  the type to actually take the time to learn or you would have already found out what I have shared here to be true and stopped your immature taunts and personal attacks.

@kuribo if you are so great with amp design, how come you have not designed a better amp?

Not following your logic. Probably because there isn't any logic to your replies.

@kuribo Then why don’t you go design a better amp then? You are not helping anyone complaining about this one.

You appear to not be very skilled at searching or you would have found them. Call the manufacturer (no, it isn't Peachtree).

I may not know everything about this amp but I surely know more about it's design and performance than you do...

@kuribo  that's because they are nonexistent. You were surprised by the measurements others posted. You know nothing about this amp. 

@donnylovely 

I see you still haven't bothered to find them for yourself even though I told you where to look. Seek and ye shall find.

I don't have to eat excrement to know I don't like the taste.

@ricevs to change out the wire can I use molex pins and just replace the pins in the connectors? Is there better way? Does anyone make copper pins or upgraded pins? 

@kuribo  where are those measurements man? I see you’re still bothering everyone even though you still have no experience with this amp at all.

I wasn't giving advice, I was stating facts. You and others chose to dispute and argue with those facts. If speaking the truth is "raining on your parade", maybe you need to get an umbrella.

Your post was deleted because it was abusive and off topic, as has been most of the response given here to those who have pointed out the lack of technical knowledge and blindness to science exhibited here by the kool-aid crowd. It is indeed a hobby, not a matter of life of death, so take your own advice and skip the personal attacks.

@atmasphere,  Appreciate your explanation.  I can't argue with that.  But none of the participants here were seeking "you-know-who's" advice.  That's all.  "You-know-who" felt it was necessary to "rain on the parade" regardless.  It became monotonous, and yet "he" didn't let up.

Anyway, I'm done, I've said what was on my mind and had my post deleted.  At the end of the day, it's the pure pleasure of our hobby that matters.  And that's all it is, a hobby.  Not life, or death.  Who gives a rats ass about trivial crap that doesn't mean a thing in the grand scheme in life.  We're here today, but maybe not tomorrow.  Enjoy what you have, who you have and live life to its fullest.

Again, Happy New Year.

 Why continue raining on other's parade when you don't agree with their enthusiasm, or beliefs.  It's rather confounding.

@kitsap2 FWIW, the manufacturer of the amp did get on this thread and confirmed something that @kuribo caught quite a bit of heat for here: the issue that a zero feedback class D amp will have frequency response that is load dependent. 

That issue does appear to be minor, but kuribo was not wrong.

WRT the issue of mods. I'm just using these two bits as examples: The output filter is a critical bit of engineering in any class D amplifier. It can have an enormous effect on the spurious noise generated by the amp- noise that can radiate into other components and can interfere with things like WiFi operation and digital circuits in general. Bypass caps in the circuit have a similar effect and are often chosen with care for their characteristics.

In a zero feedback amp these things can be quite critical because there is no feedback to offer any kind of correction.

When these things get changed out or removed, its guaranteed that the amp will need testing to know if it still meets important critical specs such as noise radiation thru the air or on the AC line. If this testing is not performed, if the mods are not done properly, don't be surprised if certain FM stations don't show up on your FM tuner because a buzzy sound has replaced them. So make sure that adequate testing has been performed when you have mods done. This testing should be done at the same level as if the amp were to be exported to the European Union. If it can surpass those marks it should be OK.

@treepmeyer,  I'm looking forward to your thoughts on the GaN 1 after you've had some time with it.  As the president of Peachtree said, it's not for everybody (paraphrasing).  But it definitely fits my needs and desires and I couldn't be more satisfied.

Happy New Year and new gear, 2023!

I have been following this thread with interest, especially as I have ordered a Gan1 and expect delivery any day.  I appreciate the criticisms and cautions (if not the tone of delivery).  I have a healthy respect for the "scientific" approach to audio equipment, meaning objective measurements and explanations of the physics involved.  It is helpful to avoid drinking anyone's Koolaid or succumbing to confirmation bias.  These are always risks.  However, for me the listening experience trumps all else.  The many positive comments from discerning Agon listeners - who actually have the Gan1 to hear - means quite a bit to me.  In any event I will shortly find out for myself.

Best wishes to everyone for the new year,  and please, respect and tolerance for each other.

@ricevs  I appreciate your timely comment/post.  This thread is full of very satisfied, friendly participants and owners of the GaN 1.  There, however, is one individual, who will go unnamed, that is very unhappy.  Your advice is gold.  I leveled the axe at it/him and for that, my post was deleted by the moderator.  I understand why, my fault.

And the one part of your post that really rings true is that "they" always have to have the last word.  Classic!

Happy New Year to all!

One thing I know is that using the word science does not make a statement scientific. Just as Tony the Tiger says, the voices in my head also say that the mods are gggGREAT!

I finished setting up my Fibre optical streaming in my Family room where I have a Gravity chair. My back health and musical enjoyment are going to me at the max when I get the GAN1 back. Love the simplicity of the amp, and I am making it a bit more complicated by going Fibre and ROON (though it was not too difficult to figure out).

Happy New Year to all.

I received my second GaN1. Hooked it up with my minidsp SHD and have a nice active config with my Camerton/Purifis.

I’ll end up tweaking this one also. Not for the potential performance gains, but just like having better conductors, more secure connections and cleaner signal paths.

As I mentioned in previous posts, I prefer this amp over the other GaN based and Class Ds that I have had (Peachtree GaN400, Class D Mini GaN 5, Hypex, nCore, Purifi).

Love the fact it is dead quiet, no speaker hiss, turn on/off noise. Sounds fantastic at both low and high volumes. A very enjoyable listening experience.

Yeah last three years has taught everyone to just trust the science. LMAO!

Yeah, just ignore science and reason and keep sending money.

I think it is at least 8 people on this thread that have gotten the amp and ALL love it.

When someone is posting who is righteous.....they have to have the last word/post. So, do not reply to these people as they will just keep FIGHTING and saying the same thing over and over.....and who wants to hear the same nonsense spoken by those that have no experience with this product (and refuse to listen or even... believe in listening).

Please ignore them.....they want drama....everytime you try to defend me or listening then they just keep firing back.......if you ignore them then there is no drama and no need for them to be here.....IGNORE THEM Please.

Have a wonderful NEW YEAR and may you all be blessed with LOVE, JOY, and Happiness.......