ying and yang--Lamm ML3 and darTZeel 458
- Thread starter Mike Lavigne
- Start date
Good for you... keep on dreaming!
I can't help it if you're limited by lack of your own experience Davey, it's not a dream.
david
That is great news Mike. I’m warming up to the idea of dual topology on the power amp front down the road a bit.
so nice to just enjoy, and now 3+ hours into my session, I've pulled out all the heavy jazz artillery, and this has been an 'out of body' experience. maybe my top jazz and vocal session ever. words fail me. the ML3 + dart pre + MM7's are a (trio) match made in heaven (my 2 cents, YMMV and all that stuff).
'they are here' x 100. poured a sip or three of Whistle Pig. mmmmm.
list for Micro.
'Meet Me In London', Sabina was so real in 'Estate'
'Mostly Blues....and some others', 'Snooky'
'Voodoo', 'Voodoo'
'Ben Webster at the Renaissance', 'Georgia', 45rpm
'Mulligan Meets Webster', 'Cat Walk', 45rpm
'Louie Armstrong', 'St. James Infirmary', 45rpm.
'Cannonball Adderley', 'Autumn Leaves', 45rpm Clarity stereo box set.
'Blues Moods', Blue Mitchell, 'Scrapple from the Apple', 'Kinda Vague', 45rpm
'Ellington, Jazz Party', 'Malitoba Spank'
'Love is the Thing', Nat King Cole, 'When I Fall In Love', 'Stardust', 45rpm
'Crosby, Stills and Nash', 4 disc 45rpm, 'Wooden Ships', 'Lady of the Island', 'Helplessly Hoping'
'Moondance' Van Morrison, side one.
and a few others.....
never even a whiff of dynamic or scale limitation. explosive and authoritative. projection of musical energy was superlative.
'they are here' x 100. poured a sip or three of Whistle Pig. mmmmm.
list for Micro.
'Meet Me In London', Sabina was so real in 'Estate'
'Mostly Blues....and some others', 'Snooky'
'Voodoo', 'Voodoo'
'Ben Webster at the Renaissance', 'Georgia', 45rpm
'Mulligan Meets Webster', 'Cat Walk', 45rpm
'Louie Armstrong', 'St. James Infirmary', 45rpm.
'Cannonball Adderley', 'Autumn Leaves', 45rpm Clarity stereo box set.
'Blues Moods', Blue Mitchell, 'Scrapple from the Apple', 'Kinda Vague', 45rpm
'Ellington, Jazz Party', 'Malitoba Spank'
'Love is the Thing', Nat King Cole, 'When I Fall In Love', 'Stardust', 45rpm
'Crosby, Stills and Nash', 4 disc 45rpm, 'Wooden Ships', 'Lady of the Island', 'Helplessly Hoping'
'Moondance' Van Morrison, side one.
and a few others.....
never even a whiff of dynamic or scale limitation. explosive and authoritative. projection of musical energy was superlative.
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Interesting observations. When you say some details seem glossed over you don't mean they are missing do you? Or do you mean presented in a less explicit manner?
The coherence and balance of a good SET is part of what so convinced me of the sound...before I understood why it could be so...
I think he means a lower noise floor results in a higher dynamic range .
With my tube poweramp the moment you switch it on the room is not as quit as it was , but tubes have also a lot of qualities.
But this thread keeps giving me the IF ?
If the poweramp is that good , then the pre....., cant david help or steve give a loaner , vladimir might be interested in the shoot out on a high level , one month would be enough .
Any way good that the system is operating properly now
With my tube poweramp the moment you switch it on the room is not as quit as it was , but tubes have also a lot of qualities.
But this thread keeps giving me the IF ?
If the poweramp is that good , then the pre....., cant david help or steve give a loaner
, vladimir might be interested in the shoot out on a high level , one month would be enough .Any way good that the system is operating properly now
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Not an easy or inexpensive move and you need the to add the cost of a phono too!I think he means a lower noise floor results in a higher dynamic range .
With my tube poweramp the moment you switch it on the room is not as quit as it was , but tubes have also a lot of qualities.
But this thread keeps giving me the IF ?
If the poweramp is that good , then the pre....., cant david help or steve give a loaner
Any way good that the system is operating properly now
david
I have heard SETs do much better on conventional speakers than push/pull tubes of several x the power of the given SET. We have done this experiment a number of times on the Thiel CS3.7, a 90db speaker with somewhat tough impedance. Both KR VA350i and AC Diana were clearly superior to the highly regarded Octave monoblocks (model eludes me at the moment) with black box addons and also Lamm M1.1 (highly regarded PP hybrid) and McIntosh MC501s (well regarded PP SS). Add to that the KR is the best I have ever heard Wilson X1s sound (both MkI and MkIII) and SETs are highly compatible with high sensitivity non-horn speakers like my own Decware HDTs, various non-horn Voxativs and the Horning speakers like the Eufrodite (which gets raves from shows with amps from Tron and TW Akustic for example). I have also personally heard the KR VA350i absolutely destroy both Prima Luna monos and the Electrocompaniet Nemo on a pair of big Focal Grande Utopia Be EMs (94db). Therefore, I have no doubt that Mike's own 97db Evolutions will benefit from SET. You don't need horns to benefit. Lack of energy? Color in the mids?? Not IME...
so nice to just enjoy, and now 3+ hours into my session, I've pulled out all the heavy jazz artillery, and this has been an 'out of body' experience. maybe my top jazz and vocal session ever. words fail me. the ML3 + dart pre + MM7's are a (trio) match made in heaven (my 2 cents, YMMV and all that stuff).
'they are here' x 100. poured a sip or three of Whistle Pig. mmmmm.
list for Micro.
'Meet Me In London', Sabina was so real in 'Estate'
'Mostly Blues....and some others', 'Snooky'
'Voodoo', 'Voodoo'
'Ben Webster at the Renaissance', 'Georgia', 45rpm
'Mulligan Meets Webster', 'Cat Walk', 45rpm
'Louie Armstrong', 'St. James Infirmary', 45rpm.
'Cannonball Adderley', 'Autumn Leaves', 45rpm Clarity stereo box set.
'Blues Moods', Blue Mitchell, 'Scrapple from the Apple', 'Kinda Vague', 45rpm
'Ellington, Jazz Party', 'Malitoba Spank'
'Love is the Thing', Nat King Cole, 'When I Fall In Love', 'Stardust', 45rpm
'Crosby, Stills and Nash', 4 disc 45rpm, 'Wooden Ships', 'Lady of the Island', 'Helplessly Hoping'
'Moondance' Van Morrison, side one.
and a few others.....
never even a whiff of dynamic or scale limitation. explosive and authoritative. projection of musical energy was superlative.
Guess those limitations you initially reported were more theoretical or perhaps the amps need a couple of days to settle in? I have heard this phenomenon numerous times and recently on an installation of AC Concero 65s...it took a couple of weeks to really reach their "normal" operation.
Mike's speaker could be an exception.
I am not denying KR cannot be better than the Nemo or Octave. That does not mean it will be better than Dagostino or CAT on those speakers. I heard the KR integrated vs the Lamm M1.1 on the Odeon 32 at Michael's and both acousticsguru and I thought that both did a few things well, there wasn't a winner. Also, one of the reasons I like the Kronzilla is it is the most neutral of SETs, and also with the most drive amongst the ones that I have heard. So yes, for a cone my choice of SET would be Kronzilla but I would still prefer Vitus or Dagostino or such over it.
so nice to just enjoy, and now 3+ hours into my session, I've pulled out all the heavy jazz artillery, and this has been an 'out of body' experience. maybe my top jazz and vocal session ever. words fail me. the ML3 + dart pre + MM7's are a (trio) match made in heaven (my 2 cents, YMMV and all that stuff).
'they are here' x 100. poured a sip or three of Whistle Pig. mmmmm.
list for Micro.
'Meet Me In London', Sabina was so real in 'Estate'
'Mostly Blues....and some others', 'Snooky'
'Voodoo', 'Voodoo'
'Ben Webster at the Renaissance', 'Georgia', 45rpm
'Mulligan Meets Webster', 'Cat Walk', 45rpm
'Louie Armstrong', 'St. James Infirmary', 45rpm.
'Cannonball Adderley', 'Autumn Leaves', 45rpm Clarity stereo box set.
'Blues Moods', Blue Mitchell, 'Scrapple from the Apple', 'Kinda Vague', 45rpm
'Ellington, Jazz Party', 'Malitoba Spank'
'Love is the Thing', Nat King Cole, 'When I Fall In Love', 'Stardust', 45rpm
'Crosby, Stills and Nash', 4 disc 45rpm, 'Wooden Ships', 'Lady of the Island', 'Helplessly Hoping'
'Moondance' Van Morrison, side one.
and a few others.....
never even a whiff of dynamic or scale limitation. explosive and authoritative. projection of musical energy was superlative.
Thanks for the list - it helps a lot to understand your perspective and preferences. Considering your close listening distance and the high sensitivity of your bass amplified speakers I would not expect dynamic limitations.
BUT IMHO the best rule in high-end is that all high-end rules have as many exceptions as explanatory cases ...
never played large scale orchestral, warp 9 rock'n roll, or electronic. so did not push things to the 'over-the-top' level. and that was my idea, just play stuff that did not demand the highest current to really get going.
OTOH i do think there is a somewhat higher energy level than before, maybe it's settling, or something. it seems to projecting more energy naturally at all volumes. i did discover Thursday night that the 6N30P's had been mixed up side to side for the correct amp, and so i switched them. somehow one serial number quad got put in the other serial number crate. i had swapped out my 'extra' set Monday night trying to resolve the crackling tube issue (which turned out to be a single 12AX7). i was switching the original 6N30P's back in to see if they were also 'crackling' (they were not) when i realized the boxes were for the other serial number. i had originally carefully installed the tubes on the amp from the crate they came from.
this is all new stuff to me so don't know the whims of SET's.
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Considering that I wouldn't own a Vitus or Dagostino on any speaker, I can't agree with your idea there.
Regarding CAT, we did a shootout between the JL2 Signature and NAT SE2SE and while reasonably close overall the SE2SEs were clear winners...on Apogees.
Also the VAC 30/30 was no contest to the VA350 and Diana on a couple different speakers (ref3a and Rigolettos and La Bohemes and ThielCS3.7). The VAC handily dispatched the Octaves and a Karan Integrated.
I also heard the VA350 outperform the Janis Defy7 mkiii with siltech on focal mezzo utopia be speakers near London and the Janis is one of the better sounding PP tube amps I have heard.
You haven't heard Diana properly either on conventional speakers...it is a beast.
btw; a couple months ago i did move my listening position back about 8 inches. 109 inches tweeter to tweeter, from 92 inches to 100 inches tweeter to ear. obviously my head separates my ears so that distance is not the triangle measurement, but it's close.
still nearfield (inside the equilateral triangle) but a good amount less so. it's slightly less enveloping, but overall a more natural balance and real presentation. i'd done a few things to add whole system musicality in the last year (Elite, Taiko Tana, MSB Select II, Hardpoint Trinia) and so my listening position evolved for overall enjoyment.
Morricab
Outperform clear winner , you talk about it as it is a race of some sort .
After 4 laps the CAT gets pushed off the track by the SET and here by is the SET the clear winner.
Outperform
clear winner , you talk about it as it is a race of some sort .After 4 laps the CAT gets pushed off the track by the SET and here by is the SET the clear winner.
right now I would say details are missing. but give me a month or so of frequent listening and I might more come around to your viewpoint. on vocals it's like a different recording, fine textures of the dart's are replaced with more human components. so I get that part. and there is more spooky 'presence' keys, but less detail and fine rendered information. but delicacy and special clues are more profound. higher degrees of information verses higher degrees of communicated intent. and more to-die-for tone, of course. so trade-offs.
this is just how it looks right now.
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