Introducing My System

[Ron Resnick]

How's it sounding versus Lara?

 

[Thundersnow]

How's it sounding versus Lara?

Give me a few days, buddy. I want to try and get some perspective as well as articulate as best as possible what I hear. I have some initial notes jotted down but I want things to sink in for a few more days. A piece of gear like this truly deserves it.

 

[morricab]

Give me a few days, buddy. I want to try and get some perspective as well as articulate as best as possible what I hear. I have some initial notes jotted down but I want things to sink in for a few more days. A piece of gear like this truly deserves it.

Leave it on 24/7 for awhile…it probably wasn’t completely broken in at the factory.

 

[Thundersnow]

Leave it on 24/7 for awhile…it probably wasn’t completely broken in at the factory.

Saša tells me the tubes got 10h on them. He’s telling me about 200h for the pre. Let the fun begin!

 

[morricab]

Saša tells me the tubes got 10h on them. He’s telling me about 200h for the pre. Let the fun begin!

Sounds about right…my AC Protos took around that long.

 

[Thundersnow]

 

[Tbzc]

Thundersnow, hi.

Looking at your system you went from nat magma evo to nat hybrid monoblocks to soulution 710. Could you please share your views on differences and characteristics of each of those amps? I would especially be interested in the differences between nat tube and hybrid amps.

Many thanks.

 

[Thundersnow]

Thundersnow, hi.

Looking at your system you went from nat magma evo to nat hybrid monoblocks to soulution 710. Could you please share your views on differences and characteristics of each of those amps? I would especially be interested in the differences between nat tube and hybrid amps.

Many thanks.

Hi there,

In my case, these three amps should be regarded in the context of three things — listening space, speakers that match it, ergonomics.

— Magma Evo — out of all the NAT amps by far the best ones. Tone, control, being agnostic to preamps used — got it all. WAY too much heat. Only reason why I’m not listening to it.
— NAT Symbiosis New — same sound signature as the above, but just a little less good at everything. WAY less heat. That’s why I still own it.
— Soulution 710 — awesome control, very neutral and highly dependent on the upstream components.

The NAT gear was fantastic for Marten Mingus Orchestra (and Marten speakers in general). The Marten speakers just don’t play well with my new home. Apogee Duetta very much does, and subsequently Soulution 710 is the amp of choice, because it plays better with the Apogees.

 

[Tbzc]

Hi there,

In my case, these three amps should be regarded in the context of three things — listening space, speakers that match it, ergonomics.

— Magma Evo — out of all the NAT amps by far the best ones. Tone, control, being agnostic to preamps used — got it all. WAY too much heat. Only reason why I’m not listening to it.
— NAT Symbiosis New — same sound signature as the above, but just a little less good at everything. WAY less heat. That’s why I still own it.
— Soulution 710 — awesome control, very neutral and highly dependent on the upstream components.

The NAT gear was fantastic for Marten Mingus Orchestra (and Marten speakers in general). The Marten speakers just don’t play well with my new home. Apogee Duetta very much does, and subsequently Soulution 710 is the amp of choice, because it plays better with the Apogees.

Thank you very much! Appreciate! I share your enthusiasm about NAT gear - I think it is really great. Since you are the only user I am aware of having direct experience with Magma vs Hybrid, your experience in very relevant for my next moves.

 

[Soliles]

Hey Solies, welcome to the forum and congrats on the great gear!

To get this question out of the way first — I don’t plan to go back to Mingus Orchestra from my Apogee Duettas. For me personally, and not to go into any great detail I prefer the sound and the presentation of Apogee Duettas over my Mingus Orchestra and especially how it plays in my home as opposed to my previous one. I prefer it for both movies and music (which is interesting), but I did also (imo) do a very good job in integrating the Rel No. 31 subwoofer. Without it, the slam of Duettas vs. the Orchestra could not compete.

Now, as for your second question (as I’ve interpreted it) — the main difference between the Coltrane 3 and Mingus Orchestra in my opinion is their respective “behavior in the room.” I just couldn’t get the Mingus Orchestra to get along with my current listening space and I strongly suspect this is due to the passive 10” woofers in the back vs. the downfiring port with the Coltrane 3. For whatever reason, I always had an easier time integrating a downfiring port into the space and it would usually trigger fewer room modes.

The Mingus Orchestra on the other hand was difficult in the new space from the get go. In the old space I had a lengthy hallway to the right side of the left speaker leading into a mirrored second wing of the apartment, while the new listening position is way more symmetrical in that sense and hence retaining way more bass energy. This in turn caused this rather large space to boom way too much with the Mingus Orchestra.

If we disregard this characteristic of the Orchestra, in its own right, Orchestra is definitely a better speaker than the Coltrane 3, although I suspect the new Coltrane Quintet might be better than it (I like the new Quintet choice of drivers).

As for me, I am staying with the Apogee sound/design signature (Clarisys included here as the “successor”) and not looking back. I have to say for me personally, the magic I get out of these speakers is so special it just conceptually cannot be rivaled with classic dynamic speakers. And yes, before making my final decision I did extensive head to head direct testing of Apogee Duettas (refurbished of course) vs. Mingus Orchestra.

Hi Uros,
Thank you much for taking the time to respond to my questions. Your experience with listening room geometry is quite stricking. You don't give much details about your old and new room, you have been dealing with, except the fact one room, three times smaller, with extension in a hall way ( allowing energy dissipation ...) was giving you satisfaction in terms of bass nodes...
Could you elaborate just a bit on the subject? Could it also be the height of the ceiling, the material of the wall, the floor, .... a combination of those factors played a role in your experience?.
It is indeed well known, if I am not mistaken, that ribbon/planar speakers such as Alsyvox, Clarysis or alike are " more forgiving " in terms of placement in a room, except that ideally it should be three meters away from the rear wall which does not seem to be the case in your new room neither. It also is, possibly, that those are " charging " the room to a lesser degree. You indicated you needed some subwoofer to have the slam you had with your Coltrane 3 ( although even those you were using a Rel 31). Sounds to me you are looking for an ethereal type of experience/music ( the "Church in Paris"). Would you not have kept your Martens had you (possibly) been listening more ( as well) to symphonic orchestra, .... simply more dynamic music ? My experience with ribbons is mitigated. Would you agree it also depends pretty much on the type of music one is listening too ? Thanks for bearing with me.

 

[Audiohertz2]

Actually , Panel dipoles are very difficult to get right in a room vs conventional box speakers.

 

[Thundersnow]

Hi Uros,
Thank you much for taking the time to respond to my questions. Your experience with listening room geometry is quite stricking. You don't give much details about your old and new room, you have been dealing with, except the fact one room, three times smaller, with extension in a hall way ( allowing energy dissipation ...) was giving you satisfaction in terms of bass nodes...
Could you elaborate just a bit on the subject? Could it also be the height of the ceiling, the material of the wall, the floor, .... a combination of those factors played a role in your experience?.
It is indeed well known, if I am not mistaken, that ribbon/planar speakers such as Alsyvox, Clarysis or alike are " more forgiving " in terms of placement in a room, except that ideally it should be three meters away from the rear wall which does not seem to be the case in your new room neither. It also is, possibly, that those are " charging " the room to a lesser degree. You indicated you needed some subwoofer to have the slam you had with your Coltrane 3 ( although even those you were using a Rel 31). Sounds to me you are looking for an ethereal type of experience/music ( the "Church in Paris"). Would you not have kept your Martens had you (possibly) been listening more ( as well) to symphonic orchestra, .... simply more dynamic music ? My experience with ribbons is mitigated. Would you agree it also depends pretty much on the type of music one is listening too ? Thanks for bearing with me.

Hi Soliles,

So yes, you have several questions here.

So first up yes, everything plays a role in the listening room. Forgive me, but the subject is so extensive I’d have to write an essay to go into any detail.

With that said, if you have space (especially front and back wall) planars like Clarisys, Apogees, etc. are in my opinion more forgiving than say the Mingus Orchestra — with it the side walls play a greater role and the energy from the passive woofers can be quite high. They like high ceilings as well and I do have that working for me with the new listening space. So yeah, I’d say my Apogee Duetta is definitely filling the room with less energy than the Orchestra. Even though my new space is pretty big I felt like the Orchestra required even more space.

But more than any of this, at the crux of the matter is my preference for open baffle diopole designs over classic box speakers.

Finally, see that’s the thing — the Duettas are simply better than the Orchestra in recreating the very reverb of the space — so like I heard in the church in Paris.

They also have extremely fast transients in combination with a powerful amp like the Soulution 710 (and the punch with the help of Rel 31) so I am (in my opinion) not missing much over what I was getting with dynamic speakers. In fact, I gain more overall.

That’s not to say, however, that Mingus Orchestra is not a great speaker. It’s fantastic in almost all regards. I wouldn’t have stayed with Marten for so many years. Until I’ve heard these refurbished Duettas on the Soulution, and then hearing Alsyvox and Clarisys, I didn’t think it possible for a planar speaker to have such dynamics.

Thankfully, was proven wrong so I’m back with my preferred speaker type design.

 

[Thundersnow]

——— Trafomatic Tara 30A Mini Review ———

After having spent some time listening to this preamp, as promised I will summarize my initial impressions.

So what’s the goal of hi fi for you? For me it’s simple — getting closer to the live acoustic performance in a fantastic acoustic space. If a system can reproduce that, even to a degree, it’s superior to me over one that cannot.

And what’s this live acoustic performance in a fantastic acoustic space like for me?

It’s very much like Tom Yum soup. Sweet, sour, spicy, salty and bitter are all these different flavors that are in there and yet they all somehow “work” together in Tom Yum soup. So very much like a classical orchestra — it’s got sharp, warm, neutral, sweet and cold sounds — and yet when you listen to it live it just blends together “in the right way.” A hi fi system can be all of these things or just some of them and just not get it right. It just doesn’t blend well together.

So what’s the secret sauce?

In terms of hi fi, to me it’s the preamp — at least as far as the electronics go. The preamp is the cohesive essence of the sound that either blends everything to come out “just right” or it doesn’t.

And that’s Tara 30A for me. It just ties all these different components together to get the tone out “just right”. More so than Lara? Yes. More so than any other preamp I’ve owned? Yes. More so than me wanting any other preamp down the road? For my taste of music (to stay with the culinary analogies) — yes.

I tried Tara 30A with two different DACs and different streaming/CD sources and multiple different cables. And whatever signal comes in and out of this magic box, it cooks and boils it just right. Like Tom Yum soup.

So, in other words and if you’ve paid attention closely — I’m saying Tara 30A plays music more so than any other piece of gear I’ve owned.

The end.

PS You know how just when you think the spiciness and the saltiness of the Tom Yum soup is about to overpower your taste buds, your palette is hit with the soothing gentle wave of coconut cream? That’s EXACTLY how violins hit my ears in a great live classical performance.

 

[Golum]

Happy for you man! Even better thing is that it’s made several km away from your home…local organic produce directly from the farm always tastes better (in the soup)

 

[Thundersnow]

Amen, brother Golum!

 

[thomask]

I had happily lived with Duetta Sig driven by Krell KSA 150 from 1990 to 1999.

The only reason that I let it go was to get sub bass below 30 hz.

I could get satisfactory bass from B&W Notilus 801 driven by Jadis 500.

But in retrospect, Duetta Sig was the most musical speaker in my 46 years of audio history.

I am not sure whether I will go back to Duetta or other planar speaker since I enjoy 3 D holographic imaging out of Scaena 3.2.

Congratulation on your fantastic audio journey.

 

[morricab]

——— Trafomatic Tara 30A Mini Review ———

After having spent some time listening to this preamp, as promised I will summarize my initial impressions.

So what’s the goal of hi fi for you? For me it’s simple — getting closer to the live acoustic performance in a fantastic acoustic space. If a system can reproduce that, even to a degree, it’s superior to me over one that cannot.

And what’s this live acoustic performance in a fantastic acoustic space like for me?

It’s very much like Tom Yum soup. Sweet, sour, spicy, salty and bitter are all these different flavors that are in there and yet they all somehow “work” together in Tom Yum soup. So very much like a classical orchestra — it’s got sharp, warm, neutral, sweet and cold sounds — and yet when you listen to it live it just blends together “in the right way.” A hi fi system can be all of these things or just some of them and just not get it right. It just doesn’t blend well together.

So what’s the secret sauce?

In terms of hi fi, to me it’s the preamp — at least as far as the electronics go. The preamp is the cohesive essence of the sound that either blends everything to come out “just right” or it doesn’t.

And that’s Tara 30A for me. It just ties all these different components together to get the tone out “just right”. More so than Lara? Yes. More so than any other preamp I’ve owned? Yes. More so than me wanting any other preamp down the road? For my taste of music (to stay with the culinary analogies) — yes.

I tried Tara 30A with two different DACs and different streaming/CD sources and multiple different cables. And whatever signal comes in and out of this magic box, it cooks and boils it just right. Like Tom Yum soup.

So, in other words and if you’ve paid attention closely — I’m saying Tara 30A plays music more so than any other piece of gear I’ve owned.

The end.

PS You know how just when you think the spiciness and the salty zest of the Tom Yum soup is on the verge of overpowering your taste buds, your palette is hit with the soothing rolling wave of coconut cream? That’s EXACTLY how violins hit my ears in a great live classical performance.

Nice!!

 

[morricab]

I had happily lived with Duetta Sig driven by Krell KSA 150 from 1990 to 1999.

The only reason that I let it go was to get sub bass below 30 hz.

I could get satisfactory bass from B&W Notilus 801 driven by Jadis 500.

But in retrospect, Duetta Sig was the most musical speaker in my 46 years of audio history.

I am not sure whether I will go back to Duetta or other planar speaker since I enjoy 3 D holographic imaging out of Scaena 3.2.

Congratulation on your fantastic audio journey.

I owned Caliper Signatures…great speakers but in the end I preferred Acoustats by a small margin.

 

[Audiohertz2]

Hi Soliles,

So yes, you have several questions here.

So first up yes, everything plays a role in the listening room. Forgive me, but the subjective is so extensive I’d have to write an essay to go into any detail.

With that said, if you have space (especially front and back wall) planars like Clarisys, Apogees, etc. are in my opinion more forgiving than say the Mingus Orchestra — with it the side walls play a greater role and the energy from the passive woofers can be quite high. They like high ceilings as well and I do have that working for me with the new listening space. So yeah, I’d say my Apogee Duetta is definitely filling the room with less energy than the Orchestra. Even though my new space is pretty big I felt like the Orchestra required even more space.

But more than any of this, at the crux of the matter is my preference for open baffle diopole designs over classic box speakers.

Finally, see that’s the thing — the Duettas are simply better than the Orchestra in recreating the very reverb of the space — so like I heard in the church in Paris.

They also have extremely fast transients in combination with a powerful amp like the Soulution 710 (and the punch with the help of Rel 31) so I am (in my opinion) not missing much over what I was getting with dynamic speakers. In fact, I gain more overall.

That’s not to say, however, that Mingus Orchestra is not a great speaker. It’s fantastic in almost all regards. I wouldn’t have stayed with Marten for so many years. Until I’ve heard these refurbished Duettas on the Soulution, and then hearing Alsyvox and Clarisys, I didn’t think it possible for a planar speaker to have such dynamics.

Thankfully, was proven wrong so I’m back with my preferred speaker type design.

Its sounds like its not a very well balanced speaker in respect to its bass hence its sensitivities to the room ..

 

[Thundersnow]

Its sounds like its not a very well balanced speaker in respect to its bass hence its sensitivities to the room ..

That was the main issue in my room. In theory passive radiators should behave better than classical ported designs, but it’s just not my experience with the speakers I’ve owned.