Any Digital Impressions of the Caiman yet?

[Marco]

Hehehe... Brian, it's just after having read the same old blinkered 'pearls of wisdom' from the assembled 'cognoscenti' (all six of them!), one can't help but giggle. Check out this 'beauty' from AJ:

Just to put the record straight, I feel I should point out that Tubes/valve amplifiers, although not hi fi because they are too distorted and don't have enough headroom, are actually less distorted than a record player cartridge.

Friends of my parents had Quad 2s and ESL57s and I thought that marvellous and like all this old stuff, I can quite understand why people still buy it and enjoy it, I have old cars and enjoy them, but what irritates me is when it is suggested that it somehow compares with the best of today.

And that would be ADM9s, I presume?

Oh, FFS!!

Anyway, as long as they're happy!

I am presently listening to

Title: AVRO Klassiek Beste NL MP3 256
URL: http://opml.radiotime.com/Tune.ashx?...e&PartnerId=16

Edvard Grieg - Radu Lupu, London Symphony Orchestra, André Previn - Pianoconcert in a op.16 (Decca 414432-2)

And very nice it is too.

It is better than my Quad FM Tuner.

I'm sure it is, my friend, so enjoy!

Marco.

[technobear]

My Caiman arrived on Saturday so I attached it to some headphones and to my amp and set it playing to start breaking in. Then the phone rang with a party invite so I put the music on repeat and went out.

Came back Sunday evening and thought I'd listen to a couple of tracks on the 'phones to see how it was sounding...

3 hours later I had renewed respect for my venerable Beyer DT531 'phones. The Caiman drives them superbly. Even Pendulum didn't phase them. In fact Pendulum was something of a revelation. That bass kicks like a mule! So deep... so tight.

I played loads of stuff both old and new and I don't think I have ever had the hairs stand up on the back of my neck so many times in one session. I think I will be doing a lot more headphone listening from now on.

Transport duties were of course performed by the Transporter using a Mark Grant digital interconnect. I can't say yet whether I prefer the Caiman to the Transporter as the latter doesn't have a headphone output and nor does my amp.

I'll report on how it sounds through the Croft and the Zu's after it's run in for a few more days - and how it compares to the Transporter. Suffice it to say anyone who needs a digital-only headphone amp is likely to be very pleased with this one.

From what I've heard so far on 'phones at least it firmly wacks the butt of the Lavry DA10.

[chrism]

I also recieved my Caiman on Saturday and immediately swapped out my modded 7510 (ordered it on Friday pm so big thanks to Stan).

Listened Sunday and today and yes it is a big improvement over the 7510 mod 21 and 22 (4032 opamp, wire mod and 10,000 input cap). The sound is bigger, clearer and flows better than before. I can honestly say that I have not enjoyed listening to any of my previous setups as much (inc Naim etc).

I am really happy with the PC system comprising Squeezebox/Caiman/Avondale A260 and JM Lab 926 speakers and am finding that I can hear details on familiar tracks that I have not heard before.

I also had a go at Foobar through the USB into the Caiman and found very little change in the sound quality over using the wireless Squeezebox. The USB may have a slight advantage but I could be imagining this.

Bass is a little soft but I think that this will change when its been on a few more days.

Really great product Stan and I suspect will take some beating.

Regards

Chris

[Gazjam]

My Caiman arrived on Saturday so I attached it to some headphones and to my amp and set it playing to start breaking in. Then the phone rang with a party invite so I put the music on repeat and went out.

Came back Sunday evening and thought I'd listen to a couple of tracks on the 'phones to see how it was sounding...

3 hours later I had renewed respect for my venerable Beyer DT531 'phones. The Caiman drives them superbly. Even Pendulum didn't phase them. In fact Pendulum was something of a revelation. That bass kicks like a mule! So deep... so tight.

I played loads of stuff both old and new and I don't think I have ever had the hairs stand up on the back of my neck so many times in one session. I think I will be doing a lot more headphone listening from now on.

Transport duties were of course performed by the Transporter using a Mark Grant digital interconnect. I can't say yet whether I prefer the Caiman to the Transporter as the latter doesn't have a headphone output and nor does my amp.

I'll report on how it sounds through the Croft and the Zu's after it's run in for a few more days - and how it compares to the Transporter. Suffice it to say anyone who needs a digital-only headphone amp is likely to be very pleased with this one.

From what I've heard so far on 'phones at least it firmly wacks the butt of the Lavry DA10.

Wow, I'll watch this one with interest!

[Junglist]

"I have compared it [DACMagic] to a ~£2000 DAC which uses the same chipset and it sounded identical."

junglist, which dac was that?

Linn Majik DS (with the upgraded Dynamik PSU)

[Spur07]

Wow, I'll watch this one with interest!

technobear,

i'd also be extremely interested in how the caiman compares to a transporter through amp/speakers. i've heard plenty of good stuff about the transporter. can you do a quick head to head when you next get a chance?

cheers


spur07

[The Vinyl Adventure]

Linn Majik DS (with the upgraded Dynamik PSU)

personally i think the 7520 sounds more akin to the linn majik ds i didnt think the dacmagic sounded as realistic as either ...

... as a side point - the majik ds is a bit more than just a dac.. although i do agree with the fact that the linn sq wise isnt £1600 better than the 7520 and it is expensive anyway you look at it (it is linn after all). and in fact if it is better at all i have only ever picked out the odd bit of song where i have liked the majik more.. and i have wondered if that is down to cables
where the majik wins out over any dac for me is the fact it streams music very well and doesnt need an external dac to sound good, unlike most other direct streaming divices

[Junglist]

That's cool, most people really rate the Majik, I don't know what I was missing but I'm glad because it saved me a lot of money

I wrote a review on another site but in short, I found that my Sonos ZP90 + DACMagic was, for me, on my system, indistinguishable from the Linn Majik DS despite many hours of blind/sighted testing. The Majik is a great deal more expensive than the Sonos/DM combination, so it went back to the supplier. I understand that there may be subtle differences between them that I can't perceive that to other people might make the extra outlay worth it.

Anyway I'd better stop hijacking the thread now!

Cheers

Matthew

personally i think the 7520 sounds more akin to the linn majik ds i didnt think the dacmagic sounded as realistic as either ...

... as a side point - the majik ds is a bit more than just a dac.. although i do agree with the fact that the linn sq wise isnt £1600 better than the 7520 and it is expensive anyway you look at it (it is linn after all). and in fact if it is better at all i have only ever picked out the odd bit of song where i have liked the majik more.. and i have wondered if that is down to cables
where the majik wins out over any dac for me is the fact it streams music very well and doesnt need an external dac to sound good, unlike most other direct streaming divices

[daveyboy]

How does the Caiman compare to the Beresford 7510 in terms of bass? I read on another forum that it was their opinion that the Caiman was brilliant in many respects but was a little bass shy?

[StanleyB]

How does the Caiman compare to the Beresford 7510 in terms of bass? I read on another forum that it was their opinion that the Caiman was brilliant in many respects but was a little bass shy?

The Caiman has a flat frequency response from 10Hz to 20KHz.
If you are looking for something that has a modified response with say a boosted bass and/or treble, then the Caiman would not be of any use to you.