Justin & Jerry's Hifi Blog

[jandl100]

Ooo-err ... !



a Krell 400xi integrated amp would seem to have appeared on my shelves - now where did that come from?

It sounded total shite for the 1st hour or so, but once it had warmed thru ....


If the Lord spake thusly - "Jerry, thou shalt box-swap no more" I think I would be happy. Well, with the Krell amp and Infinity speakers anyway. Providing the Lord agreed to miraculously provide any necessary maintenance on said kit.

The Krell seemeth, oops, seems to provide the rich tonality & dimensionality of the classic Quad II valve amps that I loved so much but with detail, transparency, focus, energy, propulsion, pizzaz, control and authority that the Quad amps sadly lacked.

OK - let's just say it provides excellent synergy with my Infinity speakers.

.... and I'll probably have gone off it by tomorrow!

[Marco]

LOL. Krells are funny beasts... I've heard them sound both totally shit and also sublime. Fortunately, your beastie comes from the latter camp

You certainly can't fault the build quality!

Marco.

[Mike Reed]

You're unbelievable, JERRY.

There can't be many dealers that change their stock as frequently as you do.

Maybe you ARE a closet dealer, but if all this box-swapping is driving you to religion......................

Beethoven's 'Choral' should sort things out and put class A solid state electronics to the test (and your neighbours too, no doubt !)

[jandl100]

New arrival!

A stonkingly good valve hybrid pre-amp ....





A Unison Research Unico pre-amp. Lovely phonostage, too!

[twelvebears]

Following my unsuccessful venture into the world of Horning speakers, a swap deal has resulted in the acquisition of some ProAc Studio 140 speakers and a Pro-Ject Tube Box phono stage.

The ProAcs are quite pretty aren't they?



I first wired the ProAcs up to my MF A370 solid state amp. Yuk - big mistake. What have I done? The sound was bloated, bland and lo-rez. Hmmm ... these are for the Classifieds, pronto!

ProAcs are often an easy amp load, though, so I thought I'd hook up my Chinese OTL valve monoblocks. I hadn't used them in ages - they are no use at all with my 4 Ohm average Audio Physic Virgos.
Wow - zounds & bejeebers! Music - room filling, hi-rez, spacious and wonderful, and full of vitality and pizzazz!



And those OTL amps look so purdy glowing away (and usefully heating the room!).

The ProAcs are pointing pretty much straight ahead, with their griilles on - the treble gets a little enthusiastic otherwise.

And that Pro-Ject Tube Box phono stage is a little honey, too - it's sitting on the floor between the amps and the speaker - it replaced (and thoroughly stomped on) an MF X-LPSv3 / X-PSUv3 combo.

Nice choice of giant lava lamp.... have exactly the same one myself.

And *@&$ me, that ole 370 is MASSIVE!

[jandl100]

And these are very nice, too ....



That Theta is the best DAC I've heard by a country mile ..... unless you are totally focussed on bass performance, in which case I'd vote for my old EAD DSP-1000 Series 3.

[jandl100]

New amps in the main system at Chateau Jerry .....

[jandl100]

And a completely (well, almost) new 2nd system for the conservatory ....

Usher X-719 standmounts ....



Don't they go well in there!

and a Melody SP3 valve integrated amp, with a valve-loving, colour-coordinated cat called Sooty ...



All fed by a boring looking Sony minidisc player (so I shan't show a photo!). I'm deliberately not including another source as I have a stash-load of wonderful recordings off-radio on minidisc which I never play on my main system for some reason. So this 2nd system is a great opportunity to correct this.

& all together .... yes, the place is in a bit of chaos as the ginger cat on his blanket behind his radiator is in the process of deceasing thru kidney failure (he's 15 going on 16) and if he wants to sit there with all his 'comfort paraphanalia', so be it!

[Primalsea]

Hi Jerry, what do you think of those power amps?? I head that they're not bad in a Hifi World review a while back.

Do you know any thing about electronics?? I have a suspicion they are not biased for minimum crossover distortion but instead biased to run cooler. You can adjust this easily if you know what to do.

[jandl100]

Hi Jerry, what do you think of those power amps??

Bloody good. Even better when bi-amped when they seem to come even more alive, at least into my speakers. I had a Wigwam-Mate come around the other day - actually he was selling me his Behringer A500 to turn my rig into the bi-amped setup I have now - he's got a very nice system himself including Zu speakers. .... He wasn't much looking forward to going home and listening to his own rig ... !

To be perfectly honest, in an unsighted audition I think that they would just sound like great highend amps. Yes, you can get different sonic 'flavours' with other ss and of course valves - but in terms of absolute quality they are very convincing indeed. If I wasn't an incurable Box Swapper I could easily live with them. I had a Krell 400xi integrated quite recently, imho the Behringer shows it the door - the Krell sounded coloured in the bass and smoothed over in mid and high detail compared to a single Behringer. I don't honestly think there is a single sonic aspect where I prefer the Krell. And that gets even more so with 2 of them. Some folks might not take to the Behringer bass which is deep and powerful but a little dry compared to many 'audiophile' amps - I reckon that it might just be accurate!

Do you know any thing about electronics??

No!

I have a suspicion they are not biased for minimum crossover distortion but instead biased to run cooler. You can adjust this easily if you know what to do.

I'll have to invite someone intelligent around for that! But yes, they do run cool.