Hello Again,
I've been living with the ASR for over a month now. My first impression was not good. The combination did not seem to match well. Unlike with the MF Tri-Vista, this combination led to rather harsh high frequencies of the kind one often hears in complaints about the beryllium line. I shut everything down and worried a bit while I travelled for about five weeks. While I was away, I thought about perhaps making a change on the high frequency compensation dip switches. For this I needed a long allen wrench in order to get to the screws through the heat sinks. I picked up a set of those at Ace. When I came back home, I removed the top acrylic glass piece and moved the switches to the 2 position. This completely changed and vastly improved the sound. Now I was getting a bit more of the smoothness I was enjoying with the Tri-Vista but without the harshness of the high frequencies. While I was finishing my purchase of the ASR Emitter, I also purchased a used Basis Exclusive phono amp. Unfortunately, this somewhat earlier version of the phono amp is only MC, so I had to get another cartridge and won't be able to use many of the nice MM cartridges I picked up thanks to Raul's enlightening thread. After fiddling with all the dip switches in that machine a couple of times, I can now say I'm getting the sound I really like. The ASR Emitter is incredibly detailed with an enormous soundstage pinpoint imaging and bass that absolutely rocks the house down. Anyone who says the Altos are bass shy should hear them with this amp (adjustments of course necessary). This amplifier is far, far superior to the MF Tri-Vista, which wasn't a bad amp in its own right, pretty good in fact. But compared to the ASR, it's polite, relaxed, rather recessed, and limited in bass response.
I'm quite happy now with this amp, and I can see I'll be using it for a long time, assuming it stays healthy. My one major concern is that I may at some point have to replace the battery in the battery operated power supply and that might be a bit of an undertaking, but considering the improvements I'm hearing over and above an already pretty good quality amp, it will be worth it.
Thanks once again, one and all, for the helpful recommendations. The final stage in this particular portion of the quest will be the higher quality SACDP, probably a step up in the Esoteric family of gear.
I will attempt to get the Tri-Vista repaired and hopefully fine tuned at the MF facility in England for hopefully resale or if I can't get a decent figure for it, I'll use it in a second system as a backup.
