Sparky’s comments about his beloved ARC SP-11 and D-250 servo made me think about the constant *evolution* of high-end products from the same manufacturer. Sparky jumped off the ARC upgrade bus long ago and feels he is sitting on the top of the mountain. This leads to the question of whether or not the next flagship product that a company puts on the market is really superior to their previous flagship.
I was trying to dig through my memory banks and see if I could recall a single review that panned a company’s latest flagship and said it was no better than the model it replaced. I couldn’t think of one which doesn’t mean a bunch of them don’t exist. I’m going to pick on ARC because of Sparky. I remember when the SP-15 came out and all the reviews to my knowledge said that it was much better than the SP-11. I think the big difference between the SP-15 over the SP-11 was the phono stage was all SS in the SP-15. And now you have the REF 1, REF 2, REF 3, REF 5, and the anniversary model. The REF 1 had no tubes in the power supply and that changed with the REF 2. Aside from the power supply changes, what else changed in these circuits that would explain how one model sounds better than another?
In summary, is everyone’s experience that new flagship models are always superior to the model it replaced? And Sparky if you’re reading this, I have been around technicians and engineers my entire life and any tech that has the nickname “Sparky” has usually done something stupid and had the **** shocked out of them. What’s your story?
I was trying to dig through my memory banks and see if I could recall a single review that panned a company’s latest flagship and said it was no better than the model it replaced. I couldn’t think of one which doesn’t mean a bunch of them don’t exist. I’m going to pick on ARC because of Sparky. I remember when the SP-15 came out and all the reviews to my knowledge said that it was much better than the SP-11. I think the big difference between the SP-15 over the SP-11 was the phono stage was all SS in the SP-15. And now you have the REF 1, REF 2, REF 3, REF 5, and the anniversary model. The REF 1 had no tubes in the power supply and that changed with the REF 2. Aside from the power supply changes, what else changed in these circuits that would explain how one model sounds better than another?
In summary, is everyone’s experience that new flagship models are always superior to the model it replaced? And Sparky if you’re reading this, I have been around technicians and engineers my entire life and any tech that has the nickname “Sparky” has usually done something stupid and had the **** shocked out of them. What’s your story?