February 26, 20233 yr I believe @Kerrymentioned breakfast at the hotel, so I'm going to head down here in a few minutes.
February 26, 20233 yr I just got to the hotel. We’re on the 8th floor. There’s a couple of restaurants here. I’ll post once we figure it out.
February 26, 20233 yr Author 7 hours ago, swt61 said: You've been out of the circuit for so long Dinny, you must be down to just a few dozen DACses! He claimed he only has one DAC, unless there are some stored away in boxes somewhere. 😆
February 26, 20233 yr 2 hours ago, Voltron said: He claimed he only has one DAC, unless there are some stored away in boxes somewhere. 😆 Pfft! Next thing you are going to tell me is that he has developed a fondness for Maraschino liquor.
February 26, 20233 yr 7 minutes ago, morphsci said: Pfft! Next thing you are going to tell me is that he has developed a fondness for Maraschino liquor. Or his maid has?
February 26, 20233 yr Author Shelly, Marc, Claire and I had a great time at the Village Vanguard seeing John Zorn's quartet with Julian Lage. Great stuff. Sorry that our Travel Team time has again come to the end, but I am really glad we're getting the band back together! Next time we need even more participation. This place is right next to our hotel. I'm thinking I need to get some dumplings to keep the streak going...😁
February 27, 20233 yr Lage was just fantastic - i believe this was pretty much a unplanned jam session that shows off his talent https://youtu.be/Yrryw0HxV-A
February 27, 20233 yr It was great to see some old friends this weekend and make a few new ones. Hopefully it can be a little sooner until our next chance to get together.
February 27, 20233 yr Hopefully you all avoided this NYC "welcome" https://www.fox5ny.com/news/manhattan-apple-headphones-stolen-nyc-spree
February 27, 20233 yr Boy, the hf peeps are sure waxxing on and on about that Viva amp in the CJ meet thread (or amps, the stat one too). Hadn't heard of them (or remembered), but then ran across a thread here with Kevin and Birgir dissing it for the usual types or reasons (ala Rudistor or Mikhail). Nice Alps pot. All of this for $17K? SIgn me up!
February 28, 20233 yr I only listened to the Viva electrostat amp with the X9000s and after going between Kerry's T2, a BHSE and the Grand Cayman, the Viva just felt... sad. Within 10 seconds I knew it was not doing a good job, just sounded kind of weak and laid back in a bad way. Plus, a $17K amp using the same shitty plastic sockets you can buy for 20 cents while paying extra to have the screws holding the thing together engraved with the brand name? Seriously not impressed.
February 28, 20233 yr it Was great seeing everyone ,its been a long time.Also meeting emooze for the first time. Thanks Marc for dinner Sat Night The Viva amp was very unimpressive. Edited February 28, 20233 yr by bozebuttons
February 28, 20233 yr It was fantastic seeing everyone. At the Newark airport headed back to TX. 7 hours ago, justin said: Viva = Verified Insufficient Voltage and Amperage I thought it was Diva... did not listen.
February 28, 20233 yr If that is the case, it also failed in that regard. Needed more rhinestones and chrome.
March 1, 20233 yr It needs more mil-spec gold anodizing... 😉 I tried to listen to the Viva a few times but it was always occupied. The fact that they use Rifa caps for coupling, the same type which is notorious for failing short as X and Y caps in PSU's... yeah this is not a good thing. It was awesome seeing everyone and totally worth it for landing back home this morning running on 23 hours with no sleep. I didn't try a whole lot of stuff other than the DCA headphones and I tried the Hifiman Shangri-La too out of the Headamp amps. What a fucking waste of time that thing was, did a direct comparison against the Audeze CRBN and it failed in ever regard, didn't do a single thing better than the CRBN's. It is vague sounding with no real impact and being Hifiman... built like absolute shit.
March 10, 20233 yr On 3/1/2023 at 8:16 AM, spritzer said: It needs more mil-spec gold anodizing... 😉 I tried to listen to the Viva a few times but it was always occupied. The fact that they use Rifa caps for coupling, the same type which is notorious for failing short as X and Y caps in PSU's... yeah this is not a good thing. It was awesome seeing everyone and totally worth it for landing back home this morning running on 23 hours with no sleep. I didn't try a whole lot of stuff other than the DCA headphones and I tried the Hifiman Shangri-La too out of the Headamp amps. What a fucking waste of time that thing was, did a direct comparison against the Audeze CRBN and it failed in ever regard, didn't do a single thing better than the CRBN's. It is vague sounding with no real impact and being Hifiman... built like absolute shit. What do you think of Grand Cayman?
March 10, 20233 yr I only spent a few minutes with it using the new DCA and Shangri-la SR with an unfamiliar source so I can't really comment on it. No issues I could hear but I'd need to spend some more time with it. It's an impressive beast though. I forgot to mention I also tried the Warwick Audio Bravura... what a piece of shit that is. Now the amp was broken so no high gain mode available so I couldn't push the volume far enough. Still it is the blandest sound imaginable, it does nothing well and you can clearly hear the DSP doing its best to try and fix the sound of the single ended transducers. I suspect this will be far worse when the volume is pushed to normal levels. I actually have a couple of the Sonoma M1 headphones (dirt cheap now) and was planning on designing an amp for them (the Bravura uses the same amp) but I might not bother. They clearly can't work with a direct signal so my plan is to just reuse the housings and design proper electrostatic drivers that fit in there.
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