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Review: Spectron Musician III Signature Edition Amplifier

Category: Amplifiers

This review is of the newly released Spectron Musician III "Signature Edition" MSRP $5995. The signature edition has improvements over the $4995 standard version (which is an exceptional amplifier as-is) that improve the specs and sound to the degree of making it a strong competitor to $20K-40K reference monoblocks. John Ulrick (former co-founder of Infinity and creator of the first digital amp in 1974) has really outdone himself with this new design. The Musician III Signature version is one of the most natural, detailed, robust and transparent amplifiers I have ever had the pleasure of listening to. The soundstage is so vast that when I closed my eyes, my once constricted sounding listening room sounded like someone snuck into my new home and added an extra room behind the speakers! Ok, I may be exaggerating about the stage a little bit but not about the clarity, detail and bass authority. This amp is POWERFUL and difficult loads do not even phase it. I have MBL 111E Omnidirectional speakers connected to it. I originally focused my attention on the ship anchor sized MBL 9011 monoblocks and fell in love with them at CES 2005. The Spectron was purchased to be a temporary place holder until I could afford the MBL giants. After purchasing this tiny, less than 60 lb. digital powerhouse, I have no desire to shell out for Monoblocks that cost as much as my new BMW 5. Everyone recognizes that the new digital designs are powerful and efficient but there exists an industry wide stigma about the musicality of most digital designs. Many inexpensively or poorly implemented digital chip based designs simply do not have the warmth and natural sound of the finest tube and class A solid state amps. The Spectron Musician III Signature is in a category all by itself. I enjoy listening to cello and piano. I ran through about 2 hours of "The Essential Yo Yo Ma" and was shocked. The Spectron revealed nuances and micro details that I never noticed previously on tracks that I listen to frequently. The bass is robust, strong and very controlled. The Spectron sounds nothing like many of the digital ice-power or tripath based designs. The Spectron is very transparent. What comes out of it is exactly what you put into it. Use a great power cord and exceptional source equipment and you cannot lose with this amp. Other Spectron owners tell me that tube preamps such as BAT are a perfect companion for the Spectron. If you are considering purchasing a new amplifier in the $10000+ category, you owe it to yourself, and your wallet, to give the Musician III Signature a listen. Be sure to have a pair of well respected tube or solid state amps that cost at least twice as much in the same room for A/B comparison. You will be amazed! The manufacturer burns in the amps for a week or so at the factory and informed me that I need to give it at least a week of burn-in at home to fully appreciate it. After a few hours of warm up, right out of the box, it sounded great. I am on day 4 of listening and it just keeps getting better.

Strengths: Powerful, Open Soundstage, Critical Midrange is natural and dynamic. Nice build quality. Pretty Face

Weakness: No rack mount option at this time.

Associated gear
Theta CBIII w/Extreme DACS running 2ch
Underwood Modded Denon 3910
MBL 111E Omnidirectional Speakers
PS Audio Duet
Mr.Cable Musician Power Cord

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sodapop OP
16 posts
 
Zaikesman/Eldartford, Sorry it has taken me so long to respond. Yes, I owned all of the amps I listed and used them all with my MBL Speakers. The digital amps I auditioned were, nuforce, bel canto and a few others. I am quite aware of the UcD/Hypex and even the Zetex designs. I can only write about the amps that I have actually heard on my speakers in my setup at my home. We all know that listening to something in a room at CES with different source equipment than what we have at home is not a proper way to compare equipment. It has to be an A/B comparison with all outside conditions remaining constant. Zaikesman I would imagine that the Spectron M3 Signature would be an excellent mate to your Thiel 2.2's. I LOVE Jim Thiel's designs. Plus he is really a great guy.

The age of class D has arrived... let's hope it keeps getting better and better. I am reminded of the past when tube amp consumers were skeptical when solid state designs first arrived on the audio scene.
zaikesman
3,017 posts
 
Thanks Sodapop, I'd even forgotten I ever posted here...I really enjoy the DNA-500, which actually runs fairly cool and doesn't suck a ton of wall power. I'll wait on any more amp auditioning until I upgrade my speakers, which are about due at this point in my system, but would be interested in hearing this amp if anybody near me carries it. BTW, any opinion about the Spectron speaker cables?
katzs02
6 posts
 
"I am reminded of the past when tube amp consumers were skeptical when solid state designs first arrived on the audio scene."

Yeah, but at least for the first 20 years of solid state, those skeptics turned out to be totally right... By the way, I am purely a solid state guy, yet I realize that through the '70s they totally sucked. The doubters of digital sources in the '80s werre also totally right, and we pretty much all acknowledge now that 1980s digital recording suck. I'm still in the process of throwing mine out.

So let's not dismiss skeptics of switching designs just yet.
I suspect that switching amps will not sound their best until at least the first 10 years of their implementation.

--Seth
zaikesman
3,017 posts
 
Seth: I own many 80's CDs that sound just fine, so if you're throwing yours away, please feel free to throw 'em over here.
dob
577 posts
 
Seth,
You wrote:
"So let's not dismiss skeptics of switching designs just yet. I suspect that switching amps will not sound their best until at least the first 10 years of their implementation."
The first calss D amp was designed by John Ulrick, currently of Spectron, in....1974, so 10 years are long gone. I agree with sodapop that one must audition the amp in their our acoustic environment and sodapop described Specton amp after 4 days of listening - whereas, Spectron people told me that one need to wait good 3-4 weeks for the amp to fully open up. I listen to it in my listening room and I am tube guy and this amp was as good as the best tube amps I had or auditioned (for example, Ken Stevens of CAT -JP2) and its only in midrange, The highs are purely the best in the world and bass was always strenght of class D.
As I understand, TAS took Signature Edition for review so in about half year or later, we will read their learned opinion - but I know what I hear by my own ears in my own system and my own listening room!!!!!
Rafael
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