£50 extra, which is what I am charging.Quote:
Originally Posted by Labarum
Printable View
£50 extra, which is what I am charging.Quote:
Originally Posted by Labarum
Seconded - it's definitely not bass shy here either.Quote:
Originally Posted by leo
I've been playing Pendle Coven's 'Uncivil Engineering' through the Caiman. It's a deep bass monster of a CD and it sounds great through the Caiman.
:gig:
Having the Caiman for 3 weeks, I am absolutely convinced that this is the dac for me and my system.
I have a 7510 as well but what strikes me most is that the Caiman definitely has better mids. For example, when I listen to streaming opera, I can actually understandably hear each single German (or English/Dutch or whatever language I understand) words and sentences, which wasn't always the case with my 7510.
I also very much enjoy the bass my system produces with the Caiman. Nice and punchy but not overdone. I don't have to use my (very musical) MJ Acoustics pro 50 sub when listening to CD/Squeezebox.
And then the headphone amp. My Senn HD-570 seems like revived! This headphone is known for its neutral sounds which is why I bought it in the first place. The Caiman tickles its bass region though in a way the 7510 never did before. Just like with phoneless hearing the bass is very much there but not overdone, not booming. I was looking for an audiophile replacement for my HD-570 before I got my Caiman but I decided to keep it.
With my system in mind I think, with the Caiman, the sound can't be much better. I still visit AOS on a daily base to check if Stan finally has been given the CE approval to market his upgraded psu though.
Plus the knowledge that only 2 of 3 dozens of other lucky ones can enjoy the pleasure of a Caiman. :eyebrows:
Well my Caiman has now been installed for 1 week - the new Creek Amp/Silver High Breed I/C's a week tomorrow. First question to Stan - I've never previously turned any components off - my recently retired Audiolab amp having been switched off only ever for 4 house moves, 1 accident by an ex! (she didn't become an ex just because of that!) and the odd power cut in 13 years - do you envisage this being a problem with the Caiman?
Well, initially I bought the Caiman partly for the Roku Soundbridge (I've stopped using it the past couple of years as it sounds so inferior to my CD player) but mainly for Laptop based music - I'm very drawn to Spotify, Last FM etc, as well as looking at other options now bandwidth is no issue. However, as I had a spare Coax input (the toslink is taken up with my Xbox360, and the PS3 is currently connected to the plasma - the hi-fi setup has a monitor shared between the laptop and xbox so I can play games or listen properly to internet music whilst my wife watches her crappy soaps...) I also connected the CD player up, interested to see how the Beresford might put up a brave fight in some A/B comparisons... Well, little did I expect the DAC to beat the onboard one on the KI Signature, maybe naively, I thought a £600 player would have better computer circuitry!
Having directly compared the 2 over the last week, a casual listen would suggest that the Caiman is bass *light* compared to the KI, but in fact detailed comparison has shown that the Caiman is much tighter and controlled in the bass rather than just trying to impress with bags of bloated bottom end. I would agree with some others on here that the amazing difference is in the midrange - separation and clarity greatly improved. I think the biggest difference I can notice is the soundstage - especially with early stero recordings (Louis Armstrong, for example) it seems about 25% wider through the Caiman than straight out of the analogues on the CD.
So, I bought the Caiman to try and bring streaming and Internet music up to the quality of CD - does it do that? I have absolutely no idea, I can't drag myself away from the cliche that I have become, "rediscovering" my CD collection (god I hate that expression, but it is just so damn true!)
I don't switch any of my system off.
I don't want to drift the thread, but it does apply to the DAC - my reasoning has not been as much to sonic performance but to component failure - I argue that the constant heating/cooling/heating cycle is what will cause parts to fail - the initial surge of electricity when you power up being the most damaging - i.e. how many times has a light bulb blown on me an hour or two after it was switched on? Never - they always blow when you turn them on. If you never turn them off, they can't blow? Complete amateur/non-technical rationale, but I bet I'm right!Quote:
Originally Posted by MartinT
Generally, lack of power cycles does preserve electronics. They also sound better :)
I am sorely tempted, the 7510 has no problem producing bass, so if this has better bass, without losing the depth, then excellent :)
I wouldn't swap out your 7510 just on the basis that the Caiman may have better/more/less bass.
If you are trying to achieve the most realistic reproduction of music in your home possible without resorting to spending megabucks then I believe the Caiman will move you closer to that aim.
Regards
Oh I hear you on that score, it's just obviously when words like bass shy are used, my immediate reaction is to think it has no noticeable bass then, whereas the sensible thing to do would be to ask compared to what? Of course bass isn't the only concern, it's a cocktail of things which it sounds like the Caiman has :smoking: