What's Best? Soulution, CH Precision, Vitus, or Ayre?

[andromedaaudio]

You only need 48k for the pre to “prove” it

For a good comparison you need transparent speakers and a transparent power amplifier .
I dont think the JL 5 has the last word in defintion , speakers are good enough afaik


Ps If you buy it of me for 48 K if i m wrong i give it a shot

 

[morricab]

For a good comparison you need transparent speakers and a transparent power amplifier .
I dont think the JL 2 has the last word in defintion


Ps If you buy it of me for 48 K if i m wrong i give it a shot

I guess you need some transparent speakers?

 

[andromedaaudio]

I guess you need some transparent speakers?

Help me ...... horns ??

 

[andromedaaudio]

I guess you need some transparent speakers?

I can tell you i would n t trade my speakers for Wilson XVX, ALEXX 5 certainly not the bass region
I also wouldnt trade the Rockport Lyra bass for my designs , ... highs/ mids in the rockport is very good.
The new magico S3 mids / highs is also very good , arguably the Berylium tweeter is more transparent then a softdome

 

[JackD201]

I will PM you my email as I don’t do WhatsApp…would be curious to hear.

I am glad you understand what I am going on about though with breathing. I first really discovered this in live music sitting very close to unamplified instruments. One memorable experience was I was at a jazz concert in Tonhalle Zurich and was hearing Kenny Baron on piano and a Swiss guy (name eludes me) on Saxophone. We were in the second row and what I noticed was when the Sax guy played soft the sound stuck close to the horn but as he would get louder the sound would expand out towards me like a bubble and then recede with decreased intensity…breathing.

I heard the same listen to violin in a modest sized room…the acoustic power of a Stradivarius is bind blowing and does a similar breathing in smaller spaces.

That is something I look for them as part of realistic presentation of music and only heard it in playback when I went horn/SET…my planars…as good as they were, never could do it. For me, it’s indispensable if I want a lifelike playback…of course not all recordings allow it to happen.

Give Stavros at Aries Cerat a call…no need to worry what will happen to LAMM…

Which KR did you hang on to? I was a KR dealer in the past and still am fond of their products.

Oh I'm pretty sure we are talking about the same thing when it comes to breathing. It was that very thing that pulled me in the first time I heard a 300B and that was only on an Antique Sound Lab integrated with 2 way monitors I had in my newly wed flat with an Arcam CD player. Wow so long ago. At that time I was doing second or third hand Levinsons and entry maggies, dynaudios and B&Ws. There was something there, then found BAT, then Lamm. SETs now an integral internal reference 300Bs, 2a3s, and 45s as I made many friends in the local DIY community. The thing is for me is that I will admit it, I'm a bass head. If I had any musical chops my dream would be to be Jaco LOL In geek speak my slope would be definitely a live slope in a large space, much steeper than the B&K but the bass HAS to be articulate and controlled with no droning, The only time I've heard these with sets and horns was at a dear friend from one of our southern islands Victor Sierra who was long ago part of the Victor Brooks tandem out of Utah. He had HUGE horns he woodworked with his team and he always multi-amped these set ups. Last week when we met up at the show he laughingly told me a story that at one point one pair of his base horns "accidentally crept out of the back of his house into his cousin's property because the horns that stuck out of his wall reached there. He's now playing with his own field coil designs and is poised to make an international release. Smaller is what he promised his wife. He is a happy Stavros fan owning the DAC and Amps complaining only that he would have to be a slave with his own build to Stavros' penchant for making 12v output DACs and low gain stages down the line. He's having a ball with Aries Cerat for sure. There's a picture of his entry level 3 way horns I baby sitted in my room with Lamm L2 Ref and ML2.1s in the Stromtank brochure book in fact. Lovely, well integrated highs and mids but the bass couldn't catch up, even with a pair of RELs for the crawl. Small scale classical, Opera and jazz however was to die for.

I'm all about a coherent wave front and that needs either bigger speakers I can't fit or power that emulates if not perfectly traits I will never let go off with SETs. The initial attraction to CH was in their linearity on the top end to RCA 2a3s. A tube I actually prefer to 300Bs. I maintain a small collection of Original 300Bs and RCA 2a3s along with 300B re-issues. I think when people say I moved to CH because they are tube like they think it was more in the, you know, maybe the el34 vein or 300B being used in a moderately sensitive speaker. Many will probably be shocked to hear how linear a 300B is in a true 100dB 8ohm speaker. It was more for the top end and the bottom end, the midrange to bridge the two came later with the .x upgrades to the 1 series and now the 10 series. Battery power sealed the deal. In my limited knowledge the elephant in the room is solid state rectification, I was shown by a very smart engineer that this is where line noise does its damage. Taking as much of that noise away as possible as CH does with its robust high Kvar filtration in their power supplies minimizes that noise, feeding them even cleaner AC from a battery based quality inverter like the Stromtank is the closest I've hear to tube rectification. Add this all up and its a different breath but no longer that different. I don't know what the future will hold but the trend is in a positive direction as far as I can see.

I kept the P-135 that uses 45s. These IS our top seller by the way. Big bang for the buck, My cousin gave me Cunninghams but use the not too shabby KR 45s to prolong the life of the Cunninghams, I also maintain a pair of 1610 DX2s and a pair of VA-200s. The KR Yin and Yangs. These are high powered and think they will go well with both the Ultra 7s which have I believe are a true 91 dB/w/1m and the Marten Septet, both fairly benign impedance loads.

What I see down the line is Victor building me a set of Horns someday of moderate size and multi-amping them. That is very challenging stuff even if I did have another large well sorted space to house them. It would also likely be a digital based system because these systems will be in two different cities, my city and future country escape. So it is a long way off. I was thinking about what I said about going to munich and over dinner realized the smart thing to do is go with a local guy who has proven to me time and time again that he has the chops, humble as he is in life and demeanor. Cracking sense of humor too. Being buddies aside from local helps in the dinero department too. That stuff doesn't grow on trees unless you have an orchard which I don't.

VSA speakers have that balance I like, they aren't that overly punchy bass that can be fatiguing but can be very textural and tuneful. Bass that blooms but can also stop on a dime. They are also very, very coherent WHEN you put in the work in both placement and employing the autoformers properly. Like the CH there are a lot of parameters to play with. Luckily I've been working with VSA since 2005 and I think I know their unique dispersion pattern and the set up procedures to bring the best out of them more than most learning directly from Albert over 10 different models. A dozen and a half since Leif and Damon took up the cudgels. I've also been working with CH for years now, one might say before they were famous. Getting these two to gel, I admit took some time as I learned on the fly to combine them and some hair loss but as we know, there are no free lunches in this game. An inspiration is Steve who to this day is continuing to get more and more out of his X2s than I could ever imagine achieving with those loudspeakers. Our systems always sounded good out of the box but getting to what I consider great will always takes effort.

 

[LL21]

Oh I'm pretty sure we are talking about the same thing when it comes to breathing. It was that very thing that pulled me in the first time I heard a 300B and that was only on an Antique Sound Lab integrated with 2 way monitors I had in my newly wed flat with an Arcam CD player. Wow so long ago. At that time I was doing second or third hand Levinsons and entry maggies, dynaudios and B&Ws. There was something there, then found BAT, then Lamm. SETs now an integral internal reference 300Bs, 2a3s, and 45s as I made many friends in the local DIY community. The thing is for me is that I will admit it, I'm a bass head. If I had any musical chops my dream would be to be Jaco LOL In geek speak my slope would be definitely a live slope in a large space, much steeper than the B&K but the bass HAS to be articulate and controlled with no droning, The only time I've heard these with sets and horns was at a dear friend from one of our southern islands Victor Sierra who was long ago part of the Victor Brooks tandem out of Utah. He had HUGE horns he woodworked with his team and he always multi-amped these set ups. Last week when we met up at the show he laughingly told me a story that at one point one pair of his base horns "accidentally crept out of the back of his house into his cousin's property because the horns that stuck out of his wall reached there. He's now playing with his own field coil designs and is poised to make an international release. Smaller is what he promised his wife. He is a happy Stavros fan owning the DAC and Amps complaining only that he would have to be a slave with his own build to Stavros' penchant for making 12v output DACs and low gain stages down the line. He's having a ball with Aries Cerat for sure. There's a picture of his entry level 3 way horns I baby sitted in my room with Lamm L2 Ref and ML2.1s in the Stromtank brochure book in fact. Lovely, well integrated highs and mids but the bass couldn't catch up, even with a pair of RELs for the crawl. Small scale classical, Opera and jazz however was to die for.

I'm all about a coherent wave front and that needs either bigger speakers I can't fit or power that emulates if not perfectly traits I will never let go off with SETs. The initial attraction to CH was in their linearity on the top end to RCA 2a3s. A tube I actually prefer to 300Bs. I maintain a small collection of Original 300Bs and RCA 2a3s along with 300B re-issues. I think when people say I moved to CH because they are tube like they think it was more in the, you know, maybe the el34 vein or 300B being used in a moderately sensitive speaker. Many will probably be shocked to hear how linear a 300B is in a true 100dB 8ohm speaker. It was more for the top end and the bottom end, the midrange to bridge the two came later with the .x upgrades to the 1 series and now the 10 series. Battery power sealed the deal. In my limited knowledge the elephant in the room is solid state rectification, I was shown by a very smart engineer that this is where line noise does its damage. Taking as much of that noise away as possible as CH does with its robust high Kvar filtration in their power supplies minimizes that noise, feeding them even cleaner AC from a battery based quality inverter like the Stromtank is the closest I've hear to tube rectification. Add this all up and its a different breath but no longer that different. I don't know what the future will hold but the trend is in a positive direction as far as I can see.

I kept the P-135 that uses 45s. These IS our top seller by the way. Big bang for the buck, My cousin gave me Cunninghams but use the not too shabby KR 45s to prolong the life of the Cunninghams, I also maintain a pair of 1610 DX2s and a pair of VA-200s. The KR Yin and Yangs. These are high powered and think they will go well with both the Ultra 7s which have I believe are a true 91 dB/w/1m and the Marten Septet, both fairly benign impedance loads.

What I see down the line is Victor building me a set of Horns someday of moderate size and multi-amping them. That is very challenging stuff even if I did have another large well sorted space to house them. It would also likely be a digital based system because these systems will be in two different cities, my city and future country escape. So it is a long way off. I was thinking about what I said about going to munich and over dinner realized the smart thing to do is go with a local guy who has proven to me time and time again that he has the chops, humble as he is in life and demeanor. Cracking sense of humor too. Being buddies aside from local helps in the dinero department too. That stuff doesn't grow on trees unless you have an orchard which I don't.

VSA speakers have that balance I like, they aren't that overly punchy bass that can be fatiguing but can be very textural and tuneful. Bass that blooms but can also stop on a dime. They are also very, very coherent WHEN you put in the work in both placement and employing the autoformers properly. Like the CH there are a lot of parameters to play with. Luckily I've been working with VSA since 2005 and I think I know their unique dispersion pattern and the set up procedures to bring the best out of them more than most learning directly from Albert over 10 different models. A dozen and a half since Leif and Damon took up the cudgels. I've also been working with CH for years now, one might say before they were famous. Getting these two to gel, I admit took some time as I learned on the fly to combine them and some hair loss but as we know, there are no free lunches in this game. An inspiration is Steve who to this day is continuing to get more and more out of his X2s than I could ever imagine achieving with those loudspeakers. Our systems always sounded good out of the box but getting to what I consider great will always takes effort.

One of my favorite posts of all time. A great read, and one where there is a lot of resonance with the character and quality of sound between very different technologies, topologies and sounds...and with a voice of tremendous experience and discernment. All the way to the last lines about how much time it takes to go from good to great. It is a test of endurance (and standards of excellence)...but it is worth it for those who appreciate the difference. And among those who do, few are prepared to do what it takes to get there.

I also intuitively came to a conclusion about horns which seems to be suggested somewhere in here...which is big horns truly can be special and powerful and organic...and everything...but to get that, they are BIG...elephant BIG. And so it goes...compromise. But as long as you're prepared to fight for every note and every bit of decay and every bit of balance and 'breathe of life'...you can get quite a lot of that without massive horns.

 

[andromedaaudio]

Also horns with solid state and tubes same story afaik .

I heard Blumenhofer with Solid state last sunday , best i have heard blumenhofer yet

Only positive exception id say was the demonstration in munich with Sibatone Sets / western electric horns

Below
Solid state I Tron versus tubes , the dealer switched many times on the AV horns .
I tron for me

 

[Bonesy Jonesy]

You are welcome to come to Switzerland for a visit as you are now bitten by the bug. You can hear some horns here and some other high sensitivity setups.

The LV speakers are great sounding and you don’t need SJS priced gear to make them sing…but that gear is nice.

Thank you 'morricab' for your invitation. Very kind of you and very much appreciated.

 

[morricab]

Oh I'm pretty sure we are talking about the same thing when it comes to breathing. It was that very thing that pulled me in the first time I heard a 300B and that was only on an Antique Sound Lab integrated with 2 way monitors I had in my newly wed flat with an Arcam CD player. Wow so long ago. At that time I was doing second or third hand Levinsons and entry maggies, dynaudios and B&Ws. There was something there, then found BAT, then Lamm. SETs now an integral internal reference 300Bs, 2a3s, and 45s as I made many friends in the local DIY community. The thing is for me is that I will admit it, I'm a bass head. If I had any musical chops my dream would be to be Jaco LOL In geek speak my slope would be definitely a live slope in a large space, much steeper than the B&K but the bass HAS to be articulate and controlled with no droning, The only time I've heard these with sets and horns was at a dear friend from one of our southern islands Victor Sierra who was long ago part of the Victor Brooks tandem out of Utah. He had HUGE horns he woodworked with his team and he always multi-amped these set ups. Last week when we met up at the show he laughingly told me a story that at one point one pair of his base horns "accidentally crept out of the back of his house into his cousin's property because the horns that stuck out of his wall reached there. He's now playing with his own field coil designs and is poised to make an international release. Smaller is what he promised his wife. He is a happy Stavros fan owning the DAC and Amps complaining only that he would have to be a slave with his own build to Stavros' penchant for making 12v output DACs and low gain stages down the line. He's having a ball with Aries Cerat for sure. There's a picture of his entry level 3 way horns I baby sitted in my room with Lamm L2 Ref and ML2.1s in the Stromtank brochure book in fact. Lovely, well integrated highs and mids but the bass couldn't catch up, even with a pair of RELs for the crawl. Small scale classical, Opera and jazz however was to die for.

I'm all about a coherent wave front and that needs either bigger speakers I can't fit or power that emulates if not perfectly traits I will never let go off with SETs. The initial attraction to CH was in their linearity on the top end to RCA 2a3s. A tube I actually prefer to 300Bs. I maintain a small collection of Original 300Bs and RCA 2a3s along with 300B re-issues. I think when people say I moved to CH because they are tube like they think it was more in the, you know, maybe the el34 vein or 300B being used in a moderately sensitive speaker. Many will probably be shocked to hear how linear a 300B is in a true 100dB 8ohm speaker. It was more for the top end and the bottom end, the midrange to bridge the two came later with the .x upgrades to the 1 series and now the 10 series. Battery power sealed the deal. In my limited knowledge the elephant in the room is solid state rectification, I was shown by a very smart engineer that this is where line noise does its damage. Taking as much of that noise away as possible as CH does with its robust high Kvar filtration in their power supplies minimizes that noise, feeding them even cleaner AC from a battery based quality inverter like the Stromtank is the closest I've hear to tube rectification. Add this all up and its a different breath but no longer that different. I don't know what the future will hold but the trend is in a positive direction as far as I can see.

I kept the P-135 that uses 45s. These IS our top seller by the way. Big bang for the buck, My cousin gave me Cunninghams but use the not too shabby KR 45s to prolong the life of the Cunninghams, I also maintain a pair of 1610 DX2s and a pair of VA-200s. The KR Yin and Yangs. These are high powered and think they will go well with both the Ultra 7s which have I believe are a true 91 dB/w/1m and the Marten Septet, both fairly benign impedance loads.

What I see down the line is Victor building me a set of Horns someday of moderate size and multi-amping them. That is very challenging stuff even if I did have another large well sorted space to house them. It would also likely be a digital based system because these systems will be in two different cities, my city and future country escape. So it is a long way off. I was thinking about what I said about going to munich and over dinner realized the smart thing to do is go with a local guy who has proven to me time and time again that he has the chops, humble as he is in life and demeanor. Cracking sense of humor too. Being buddies aside from local helps in the dinero department too. That stuff doesn't grow on trees unless you have an orchard which I don't.

VSA speakers have that balance I like, they aren't that overly punchy bass that can be fatiguing but can be very textural and tuneful. Bass that blooms but can also stop on a dime. They are also very, very coherent WHEN you put in the work in both placement and employing the autoformers properly. Like the CH there are a lot of parameters to play with. Luckily I've been working with VSA since 2005 and I think I know their unique dispersion pattern and the set up procedures to bring the best out of them more than most learning directly from Albert over 10 different models. A dozen and a half since Leif and Damon took up the cudgels. I've also been working with CH for years now, one might say before they were famous. Getting these two to gel, I admit took some time as I learned on the fly to combine them and some hair loss but as we know, there are no free lunches in this game. An inspiration is Steve who to this day is continuing to get more and more out of his X2s than I could ever imagine achieving with those loudspeakers. Our systems always sounded good out of the box but getting to what I consider great will always takes effort.

Very nice summary, thank you very much for sharing your experiences...great stuff! It is interesting that you kept the P-135 preamp as I reviewed this back in about 2017 for Positive Feedback. I agree with you that this is an absolutely wonderful little preamp...my friend Christoph (Christoph on this forum) loved it too...wished I had bought afterwards. Couldn't believe how good it sounded for such a small thing...and a hybrid no less!

KR Audio P-135 Preamplifier (positive-feedback.com)

It is also interesting that you find the 2A3 so good sounding. One of the best sounding amps I own is an older Silvercore from Germany 2A3 integrated amp...a whopping 3.5 watts! I don't even have very good power tubes in it (but I do have a VERY good 1955 Valvo GZ34 metal base in as a rectifier) but it is so pristine sounding on my Horning and Odeon speakers. I will be getting some nice RCAs to go in it early next year and that will probably take to insanely good sounding territory.

On my DIY active horn setup, I have some inexpensive Taiwanese DIY 300B monos that are WE91 derivatives (Thorsten Loesch modified to extend bass and highs of the original design). These decent full range but on a 110 dB mid/high horn they are ultra clear and transparent, so I know exactly what you mean by how linear they can be mated to the right speaker.

It's cool that you have already heard the Aries Cerat products. They are quite something, which is why I represent them here in Switzerland.

I say, go for a custom system built by your friend...that would be pretty awesome and a hell of a lot of fun.

 

[DasguteOhr]

Also horns with solid state and tubes same story afaik .

I heard Blumenhofer with Solid state last sunday , best i have heard blumenhofer yet

Only positive exception id say was the demonstration in munich with Sibatone Sets / western electric horns

Below
Solid state I Tron versus tubes , the dealer switched many times on the AV horns .
I tron for me View attachment 120523

Lavardin amps are perfect match with blumhofer. sounds phantastic hard to beat

 

[Argonaut]

There is indeed no point , other then it sounds pleasing to my ears .

I listen to audio gear because it makes me feel good , not to prove a point to others

Pretty much what I expected then … Yawn

 

[Ron Resnick]

I haven't given up on tubes yet by the way

YAY!!!

My focus presently is on the Wavac HE-833v2.

I vote for you putting your big KRs on your Ultra 7s!

 

[JackD201]

I can't wait to try the U7s with the VA-200s Ron, I'm betting they'll be sweet. I promised myself I will be responsible and not blow any B+ Fuses LOL

It's those flashes of lightning that made me go with hybrids then CH in the first place. I'm just happy I've landed where I have.

JImmy has the "little" Wavacs. Hmmm I wonder if he'll lend them to me Hehehehehe

 

[JackD201]

We are on our way to opening a brick n mortar. We're gonna be really able to play

 

[mtemur]

Help me ...... horns ??

If you don’t like horns then Kharma exquisite classique can be a great choice IMHO. It’s one of the most transparent speakers I ever heard. Especially when paired with good electricity and great tube electronics.