I guess I could have posted this under the Shunyata area but since there are a few changes I’ve made in addition to Shunyata gear, I’ve chosen to post here for continuity purposes.
My first update pertains to the input stage tubes on my VTL 7.5 III. Although I was extremely pleased with my NOS Telefunkens, I was disappointed to find that they appeared to crash with only an estimated 2000 hours on them. Normally, tube replacement is indicated by a gradual softening of the sound. In my case, I heard some newly observed spitting, particularly on sibilants, and my first thought is that it couldn’t possibly be the preamp tubes. I cleaned all my connections, checked the power supply voltages on the TacT 2.2XP and prayed the audio gods to no avail. Since changing the preamp tubes is easy, I finally succumbed even though I thought the tubes couldn’t possibly be the culprit. Lo and behold, that was it. I have a bevy of tubes to choose from, but I was particularly tempted to try some NOS Philips 7316s that came highly recommended by Brent Jesse. It turns out it’s a beautiful tube, and once again, is a good example of how system compatibility is always a consideration for the final sound. With my Siegfried’s, the Teles were a great match. However, it is a slightly more analytical tube than the 7316s. The Philips tube with its more liquid midrange (and still excellent bass and top end) were a surprisingly good match for the Spectral 400s. I am still tempted to try my new-in box NOS Bugle Boys and Mullards, but since preamp tubes take a good 200 hours to break-in, I’ll just have to wait until I have a good period of time for break-in. Perhaps when I’m out of town next for a week? In the meantime, I’m happy as a clam with 7316s for now.
But now, the “big one”! I’ve heard nothing but good things about the Shunyata Triton upgrade to the V2 edition from its original V1. I respect Steve’s and Russ’ opinions but their enthusiasm left me sort of “yeah, yeah , yeah- c’mon boys, we’ve heard all this before”. I was sure it was probably better. But I also thought that when I have nothing else to do with the nearly 2K it will cost to modify my unit, and when I know it won’t be grounds for divorce court, I’ll get around to it, but there was no rush. Unfortunately, Russ’s Spectral 260 amp recently bit the dust and was in need of repair. So while he was getting that done, he asked me if I wanted to borrow his unit for a week or so until his system was back up and running. We live about 1.5 hrs apart so it was an easy decision to take him up on his kind offer.
Before I put his V2 in my system. I spent the evening listening to some of my reference material, hoping I would have a good enough audio memory to be able to make the sequential comparison. I needn’t have worried. Now to be fair, I did not hear the difference instantaneously as Steven and Russ said I would. Rather it took me about 4 seconds. What can I say? I’m a slow study sometimes. But holy crap, I wasn’t ready for what I heard. What is totally exasperating is trying to understand how a product that many of us thought as damn good to begin with, could be made that much better? And I don’t mean it’s a little bit better. It’s so much better, that to be perfectly honest, it makes the V1 Triton seem broken by comparison. Let me dive a little deeper to try and convey why I think that is the case.
The idea of transparency is something we all discuss and think we understand, although I’m not sure we can articulate exactly what makes sound REPRODUCTION more or less “transparent”. One event that helped me understand this concept vividly is recalling what happened one day many years ago when I walked along a street in downtown Philly and heard live music coming our of an open window on the second story of a building. It was acoustic music- piano, sax, upright bass and drums. And what I remembered is that there was no way on God’s green earth one could ever mistake those sounds for being reproduced music. It could only have been live. And keep in mind that is with road noise, wind noise and every other polluting city street noise one can imagine. Sound reproduction surely has some physical properties we can look to in order to try and explain the “transparency” that I heard. Frequency response, amplitude, phase response, and impulse response are obvious candidates. But I suspect they are all somewhat inadequate to explain the basis for the instantaneous perception of what I heard through that open window on the street below as “real” versus reproduced sound. Transparency might explain the difference, but I’m not sure I know exactly what that means. Clearly, the speed of sound is known, but I doubt that a difference in the speed of sound accounted for the obvious perception that what I heard was real versus reproduced. Is transparency similar to the Supreme court definition of pornography (i.e. you’ll know it when you see it; or in this case, hear it), or does transparency have a physical parameter(s) than can explain the perceptual observation of knowing the sound I heard on the sidewalk was real? I honestly don’t know, but I think Triton V2 experience may have taught me something important in this regard.
One of the great benefits of using DSP, which is at the same time, potentially extremely exasperating, is that it is quite easy to tailor one’s sound to satisfy any number of parameters. For example if one wishes to increase the “presence” of the sound, one can use very judicious adjustments to do so. For example, a 0.1 dB bump from 180-400 Hz will result in increased “presence” and perhaps to some degree, provide the illusion of greater transparency to the sound one hears. However, this is often a two-edged sword, as the slightest increase in amplitude in this region can also cause the sound to be perceived too bright or too forward or just plainly not right due to a resultant loss of the correct instrument timbre. One instrument that demonstrates the effects of this adjustment most easily is the piano. Believe me, even this tiny amount of gain can screw things up big time. I know! I’ve done it repetitively, all in the effort to extract greater “transparency” from my system. However, fortunately, I have good references to fall back on, not only in great recordings, but in a 1922 Steinway that’s in my room and which always tells me when I’ve gone too far in trying to push the critical midrange of my system forward using poor judgment and a heavy hand on the DSP tiller.
Enter the revelation of the V2. It turns out that whatever the hell transparency is, it now seems clear to me that there is another approach to try an increase it in one’s audio system. I believe the secret to the V2 is that it quite simply lowers the noise floor so that the music signal stands out in greater relief from the background. And that, in my view, is what just may account for the remarkable increase in transparency that I am now hearing with the V2 across the board. . And let me be clear. It’s not subtle, and you don’t have to think hard about it. All you have to do is listen and smile. Piano now has a transparency that is closer to the real thing. The depth of the sounds that come from individual instruments are just breathtaking. I always thought that if I heard Hugh Masekela’s Coal Train (Stimela) one more time I would throw up. For goodness sake, I’ve heard it so many times that I can sing the words in Afrikaan, or Zulu, or whatever the hell language Masekela speaks. But now, I’m not just hearing the words come from his lips and chest. Rather I can hear the sounds coming from and being shaped by his oral pharynx. The same is true for female singers as well. Vocals sound much more as though they come from a real person, and not just a speaker. It’s the same with all instruments. Brass instruments such as saxophone also have an astonishing amount of increased body. The only word that then comes to mind to describe this phenomenon is that everything seems to have as greater transparency. It’s not unlike the effect I experienced when I walked down that street in Philly listening to live music coming from an open window. It was unequivocally live. So is the effect of listening to reproduced music through gear powered by the V2. It's just closer to a live presentation than it was before with the V1. I think a lowered noise floor is what accounts in part for the increased sonics I hear through the V2 and is also what helps make music instantaneously recognizable as real versus reproduced. The result is in increased articulation or perhaps as Audio Research coined the term over 3 decades ago, “high definition”. Indeed! It really is no surprise that this increased perception of “liveness” comes from a reduction in the noise of what goes through the V2. After all, noise reduction is Shuyata’s raison d’etre. It’s just that in the V2, it seems to be taken to new heights. Whatever the heck we wish to call it or attempt to explain it, it’s a hell of a magic trick. Except that it’s not magic at all. It’s just damn good engineering. Or as my mother would say regarding the engineer, “Mrs. Gabriel obviously didn’t raise a stupid son”.
When the 3 amigos visited Shunyata in the spring, Caelin told us that the V2 is like adding 2 Typhons to one’s system. I rolled my eyes and thought to myself “Bullshit. I like and respect the guy but this is a line too far. No AC distribution system is capable of that. He’s just trying to blow us with marketing hype.”. Well, it turned out that Caelin lied to us. The V2 is not like adding two Typhons. Rather, it’s more like adding three!! As impressed as I am with his power cords, particularly the digital (Alpha or Sigma) PCs, the V2 may just be his best work to date. It is truly a landmark product. Time to step away from the equipment merry-go-round for now. I am presently a very happy camper. My V1 went back for its upgrade the next morning.
