Well yes it has to be multi rail as the motherboard requires 5 separate power rails. And that is about all we will publicly share about it
Taiko Audio SGM Extreme : the Crème de la Crème
- Thread starter CKKeung
- Start date
Well yes it has to be multi rail as the motherboard requires 5 separate power rails. And that is about all we will publicly share about it
I remember distinctly as I was embarking on my resurgent high end journey back in 2007 after many years of hiatus that when looking for a source I was told that if you loose the info at the source level you can never get it back. Best to get the info and work on voicing and warmth downstream.
Indeed. In my mind it was sufficient and this was not my first side by side comparison. Anymore And it would loose the fun factor although I appreciate how some would want longer demos.
Its the New Year, so time for a little reflection and philosophising .
I was just thinking how damned lucky we are to be able to sit down quietly, peaceably, and comfortably, switch on some highly refined and very expensive hi-fi gear and spend hours listening to and enraptured by our favorite music.
We must never take this for granted and should recognise our good fortune each and every time we listen. Its a HUGELY privileged position to be in. I know some will say that they worked hard for it and therefore deserve it, but that’s simply not true. I’m pretty sure its safe to say that there are millions who work a lot harder than we do and have almost nothing to show for it, so as well as hard work, a great deal of good fortune is also required.
On that note I want to give each of you each a small virtual present. 2 recordings that bring out the absolute best in the high-end systems we use. I realise music is very much taste related but these recordings are just as much about showcasing artistry and your system‘s capabilities for intimacy, naturalness, accuracy, PRaT, drive, excitement, soundscape, ambience, mood and emotion, listener involvement and complete immersion.
You may already know or have these recordings. In that case, find some quiet time,, switch off the lights, give them a fresh listen and say thanks to the Universe for treating you so well.
A happy and healthy New Year to you all. Sincerely
Youn Sun Nah.....Lento
http://open.qobuz.com/album/0614427903020
Shpongle....Tales of the inexpressible
http://open.qobuz.com/album/jbugjs9mpgdsa
.I was just thinking how damned lucky we are to be able to sit down quietly, peaceably, and comfortably, switch on some highly refined and very expensive hi-fi gear and spend hours listening to and enraptured by our favorite music.
We must never take this for granted and should recognise our good fortune each and every time we listen. Its a HUGELY privileged position to be in. I know some will say that they worked hard for it and therefore deserve it, but that’s simply not true. I’m pretty sure its safe to say that there are millions who work a lot harder than we do and have almost nothing to show for it, so as well as hard work, a great deal of good fortune is also required.
On that note I want to give each of you each a small virtual present. 2 recordings that bring out the absolute best in the high-end systems we use. I realise music is very much taste related but these recordings are just as much about showcasing artistry and your system‘s capabilities for intimacy, naturalness, accuracy, PRaT, drive, excitement, soundscape, ambience, mood and emotion, listener involvement and complete immersion.
You may already know or have these recordings. In that case, find some quiet time,, switch off the lights, give them a fresh listen and say thanks to the Universe for treating you so well.
A happy and healthy New Year to you all. Sincerely
Youn Sun Nah.....Lento
http://open.qobuz.com/album/0614427903020
Shpongle....Tales of the inexpressible
http://open.qobuz.com/album/jbugjs9mpgdsa
Moaning about high end sound is a distinctly First World problem.
This is an interesting comment and I think your point with it is that Sean Jacobs put a lot more thought into the design of the Statement's PSU compared to the PSU he designed for InnuOS's previous flagship, the Zenith SE which utilized a fairly inexpensive picoPSU DC-ATX converter. Sean is no doubt a very capable PSU builder. Having traveled to his home in West Yorkshire a few years back to pick up a custom multi-rail LPSU that he designed and built for me, I can attest to his meticulous nature. If the Statement has a weakness, it is definitely not its PSU. With that said, Sean does not design his PSUs for warmth. He has a preference for silver-plated OFC DC wiring which has a tendency to sound detailed but also bright and I believe this is the same wiring he used for the Statement's PSU. In fact, I had to replace the DC cabling he made for my PSU with straight OCC copper as I found his cabling a little too bright for my tastes.
In my own testing, I have found Intel CPUs to sound a touch more liquid and maybe even warmer than AMD processors which to my ears, also have a tendency to sound a bit mechanical. Same thing with certain motherboards and RAM modules. Even OS tuning can result in more or less warmth. Input and output cards can also provide an avenue for sound tuning. For example, SOtM's USB cards have a tendency to sound very detailed with good separation and sound staging but can sound thin. JCAT's Femto USB card, specifically with the revised firmware, has greater body and tonally is warmer and harmonically richer. One of the things I appreciate with DIY is that I can tune to my preference. One of the things I appreciate with the Extreme is that it will have 3 potentially free PCIe expansion slots that will allow for tuning should the desire be there. No other server that I know of offers that sort of expansion capability.
Ultimately, however, my biggest goal with a music server is resolution and transparency. Never have I yearned to return to my VHS player when watching a movie or to any of my old MP3 files when listening to music. If the resolution is not at the source, there is absolutely no way to retrieve it downstream. You can sharpen edges through various tweaks that can result in a greater sense of resolution but this ultimately leads to an unnatural and fatiguing sound and so given the choice, I would choose to start with as highly resolving a source as possible and then tune the signature to preference with my downstream gear.
Romaz, can you comment on some of the negatives the Statement got when the interior of both boxes was revealed. Even I was left w less than a positive impression. Extreme internals seem a world away.
Sorry but in this Extreme thread I don't see the need to point out flaws with other products, not saying not to do it, just my opinion.
The Statement, imo, is the finest "low power" music server you can buy. It is well thought out and well implemented and takes "low power" just about as far as you can go. From a "traditional" design perspective, it literally ticks all the boxes. The Extreme, on the other hand, is a radical departure from traditional design and it's clear Emile has forged his own path with it. Which is the better path, I'll leave it to others to judge for themselves but in my case, the choice is obvious.
As for the internals, the Statement is a clean build and follows good fundamental design principles such as keeping the regulator circuitry as close to the motherboard as possible to keep impedance low and placing the large transformer in a separate chassis and GOSS shielding it to minimize EMI and vibrations. The Extreme takes it to a whole other level though. Look at the photos and I'm sure most will agree that the Extreme's internals are a work of art but for those that understand the schematics, you realize how form follows function. What requires multiple boxes from other manufacturers has been very cleverly and efficiently implemented into a single box with the Extreme.
I've read comments about the Statement which is about 60% of the price of the Extreme being quite a good value. However, I can say the same thing about my previous Zenith SE, which was 50% of the price of the Statement. To my ears, the gap between the Statement and Extreme is much larger than the gap between the Zenith SE and Statement and so we each draw our line regarding what something is worth. In my case, I know I can build something that outperforms the Statement. I believe I already have. I know I can't build anything that can perform as well as the Extreme. If I thought I could, I would never have bought one.
Point taken, perhaps warmth is not the correct adjective to describe the influence of Sean's work on the SQ but for my setup it has been positive and apparent. Can also relate to the goal of resolution and transparency as long as the musical emotion does not get lost in the process.
Really liked the VHS comparison ....
I really wouldn’t describe the Statement as warm sounding per-se. With a Statement, the degree of warmth depends entirely on the recording. Some tracks have an incredible degree of warmth and beauty, but that very much depends on the instrument, how it was played, the venue it was played in and how it was recorded. From a PSU point of view, the design of the power supply does contribute to the overall sound of the Statement, with 4 overriding qualities:
1. A sense of purity and complete blackness, so what you get is a lot more of the very low level venue acoustics and fine structural detail making the soundstage more ‘cohesive’
2. Exceptional ease and dynamics. Part of whether music sounds real or not has to do with dynamics and natural note shape. The note has to sound like it originates from its ‘mother instrument’, so if the dynamics are lacking or wrong, that doesn’t happen. The note then blooms outward as the soundwaves expand then decays in its own individual acoustic and maybe reverberates, depending on the recording. When all that is correctly recovered music can sound incredibly realistic and vibrant.
3. Exceptional pace, rhythm and timing.....together with its dynamic nature, the system can REALLY boogie, practically bouncing you out of your listening chair as your body responds. The drive, propulsion and rhythmic interplay this system can generate can make listening to recorded music really great fun....indeed a joy!. This quality was enhanced with each additional power supply. Its the same quality that gets people up and dancing to live music.
4. A level of solidarity and density, like a 3 dimensional instrument is actually producing the music. Each instrument in the mix, whether foreground or background, loud or quite has an individual identity and timbre, which accompanies the instrument into silence, so no matter how quietly the instrument is played, if you can hear it, you’ll also hear its timbral spectrum.
How do I know this is in part due to the Statement’s PS? Because following the addition of a Zenith SE I added a further 3 DC3 LPSs to my network and the above notes were the overriding qualities I identified. At one point I replaced the DC3s’ DC cables with Neotech JSSG360 made by Ghent Audio. While there was nothing at all wrong with the OEM cables, the Neotech’s superior ultra high purity copper and improved shielding did bring improvements in yet further focus and greater soundscape texture, structural detail, cohesion and recovery of the higher harmonics.
So when you bring all the above together, what do you get? Far greater believability and listener involvement. The system grabs your attention and pulls you in with a single minded focus....the music communicating far more detail, inner beauty and meaning, with lots of information about the recording venue, real or engineered. There’s no question that the power supplies make a significant contribution to these aspects of the Statement’s performance.
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I used the standard Extreme fuse for about 1,000 hours and then changed to a Synergistic Research "Black" fuse - not much of an improvement to be reported. Then a friend lent me a Synergistic Research "Orange" fuse which have just been released (or so I am told) I was expecting a small improvement if any and certainly a few days of burn in.
Well by the time I had powered the Extreme back on and returned to my listening chair. Wow!! What a difference, suddenly I could hear a wholesome difference in the bass quality and quantity, the sound stage improved and overall resolution increased. A very nice improvement overall which has only got better over the past week. I have since ordered Syn Research "Orange" fuses for the whole system. I can confidently give the Synergistic Research "Orange" fuses a 5 star recommendation.
Well by the time I had powered the Extreme back on and returned to my listening chair. Wow!! What a difference, suddenly I could hear a wholesome difference in the bass quality and quantity, the sound stage improved and overall resolution increased. A very nice improvement overall which has only got better over the past week. I have since ordered Syn Research "Orange" fuses for the whole system. I can confidently give the Synergistic Research "Orange" fuses a 5 star recommendation.
I am also using the new Orange fuse in Extreme. However I changed the fuse soon after I received the Extreme and never really compare with the stock fuse.
Good to know the significant improvement you are getting. Enjoy!
