Tweak1 hit on the head. Anyone venturing into class D have to rethink their system strategy. Class D transmits everything in your chain including gremlins emitted by your cords you don't even know are there before.
Same goes for digital sources. I have proven oversampling and upsampling are injurious to the signal. This, again, will not be so evident in conventional systems. Only in class D and fine SET systems do this truth bare out. Although the non-digital filter loaded DACs are few, the rewards using them is simply mind boggling. |
Jswarncke, the answer is yes, and no. It isn't that class D exaggerates the effects of distortion graters, they unveil the sonic damage that has always been there.
You should hear the cable talk on my system. That is another class D revelation.
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I can make my class D system sound sublime or miserable depending on what I hook my amps up with. I know, because I have done it time after time.
Every time someone brings over a glorified digital filtered digital source, the sound closes up, harmonics are lost, proper gradual decay becomes severely truncated.
Non-shielded power cords will strangle the sound. On the flip side, unnecessary insulation on speaker cables will transmit white noise.
Use ordinary power cords, good ol' hose speaker cables, and a wonder SACD player, and you have a class D disaster in the making. |
Dcstep, as you know, the Lambda is a transport. Mine has a new wheel. Also,
it has been given a big lift in sound by Henry Ho. My DAC is an Audio Note
2.1. This too has been highly advanced with updated electronics. The DAC
has 4 NOS tubes. For tube lovers this is very essential. The tube's
spaciousness and natural delivery is faithfully preserved.
Every over and up sampling player sucks the stage both horizontally and
vertically. Also, all harmonics vanish. The difference is striking. I have had a
Modright tubed Sony SACD here, and with the same negative results.
The tubes do no good in resurrecting the SACD's performance. The digital
filter damages the tube's good qualities.
The why is easy to understand if you have any knowledge of the quantum
mechanics theory. The complete signal is an ever changing pulse of great
complexity traveling near the speed of light. There is no way a circuit can
differentiate and deftly cut out the, "distortion," without taking music
nuances with it. I can prove that here. |
Dcstep, Unlike me ;D, my system is very very sensitive to everything..... especially criticism :D
My Scintillas have 40 feet of gossamer light naked ribbons. And they just do HF. The highs are audibly infinite. In conjunction with my H2O amps, twice improved, I have Henry Ho's Fire preamp too.
I like the NOS Audio Note DAC for it's purity. There is no filter software messing with it.
Tube changes, cable changes, speaker placement, are a devil's playground. I think I just lucked out. |
Ghostrider45, I use the Quantum theory because it fits. My speaker cables are extremely thin ribbons. The music signal in all it's fruition slips through without inhibition. We are talking about the very small.
I can use words like, every, always, never, because I am talking about events witnessed on my system. I would be lying otherwise. |
Jswarncke, I auditioned Cardas Golden Reference, and Jenna Labs over the same long weekend. At the time I was using Speltz Anti-Cable. The Cardas was the worst sounding of the two visitors. The Jenna less so. They both exhibit a great deal of hiss. That is the bleeding into the signal charges stored by the insulation.
On my class D system, this was an easy read.
Hearing what great results folks I know in Europe using thin ribbons insulated in Teflon, I decided to meld the two cable types, Anti-Cable and the ribbon. I knew I didn't want the insulation.
Yes, it is cheap. Try it. BTW great room! |
I had been talking about my system, yes. Mind you, it is not my system that is
causing the insulated cable hiss, non insulated cables do not hiss.
Honestly, I don't know why anyone would pile money into cabling. My house is
open to anyone wanting to see for themselves how insulation causes capacitance
white noise. |
Dcstep, How do you explain why neither the varnished Speltz Anti-Cable and my own virtually naked ribbon SCs have no hash issues? And why did the more lightly insulated Jenna sound less distorted than the Cardas?
Henry's amps are housed in a thick aluminum plate case. There is heavy internal shield separating the power supply from the module. My ICs are naked and long. My DAC and transport are obviously unaffected by any spurious ICE radiation. |
Ghostrider, I do not mean to have my ribbons held up as a measure for the signal size. I just noted that it carries all frequencies with ease. The music signal is intensely complex. Timbre, dynamics, and musicality are a sum of an unimaginably complex wave particle pulse. I don't care how carefully a chip is designed to only cut out distortion, it is not going to be able to accomplish this task without taking out the most delicate of signal. Like I said, I can probe that here, and I have done so time after time. |
Dev,
ICE makes the modules. Great amp designers, the ones who understand the principles of good basic conventional amp design, have the best chance making great ICE amps.
Henry Ho works out of Texas building his amps and preamps there. If you look at the picture of the inside of my amps on my system, you will see this is far from being a module in a box. The analog power supply is more than just a transformer and caps.
Jeff Rowland has a proven his metal designing conventional amps. There is no question he is the master of great looks. |
Dcstep, the Lambda does not cause the speaker cables to hiss. It was definitely the cables. I have no interest in picking on Cardas. All cables that have more than a minimum of insulation talks. I can literally put my ear to my ribbons and hear nothing but music now.
Insulated cables hiss. Non insulated cables don't. |
Dcstep, quit chewing on my leg. There is no RFI/EMI environment around my audio gear. The ICE module's radiation is minimized by B&W and the H2O's very heavy barriers do the rest.
If you notice, I am also using 6 ft. of Speltz ICs to reach the amps. They too have the skimpiest of shielding just designed to prevent shorts. My ribbons are only 18" long. Yes, it is Saran Wrap. The plastic touches the metal only barely. It works.
You see, no worries. You are thinking of another class D amp that is famous for polluting.
Reactive system? It is an honest system. Class D amps require rethinking the rules.
When I was running huge Pass Labs monos cabling made no difference. |
Coffeey, I fail to see you have the experience to make such a sweeping generalization. |
Class D amps, ones that are superbly designed, can approach reality given the right system gear. I can show you, Coffeey, how I can make my, "Amps," sound edgy, fuzzy, bright, and/or distorted just by inserting a regular CD player, off the shelf wires at any price, stock power cord, or a noisy and badly matched preamp. |
Hi Mapman,
I have heard my same amps used with a tube preamp, and the sound was just what many may want. It was very smooth, clean, and musical.
I prefer no tubes in the preamp, as long as that preamp is the H2O Fire. A 6moons review is in the future. This is an abnormally squeaky clean solid state preamp.
This is not to say my system doesn't benefit from tubes. I have mine in my non sampling DAC. The beauty of tubes and NOS carry through unsullied by the preamp. The advantage to my liking is the sound is more lively and detailed with the Fire aboard rather than a tube amp. |
