I'm sure you won’t regret !Change of amplifier. Not sure why to be honest, mostly because I was curious what it could bring to the table. Got a good trade-in value for my previous amplifier so the change wasn't very expensive.
McIntosh MA6900G replaced with Pass Labs XP-10 and X150.5.
I own an NP5. I'd be interested to hear your opinion when you get it settled in. Mine sounds good.... But no better than the Chrome Cast Audio it replaced.
Errr..... Fair enough.I've declared my home office/studio a hifi-free zone, primarily focused on pro audio gear (+cabling). The NP5 was needed because I work from home and can't install music software on my company laptop, not attach storage etc. The NP5 ticked a lot of boxes mainly for the Google Home integration, and I didn't really consider any sound quality considerations (I'm skeptical of streamer differences).
I originally planned to get an RPi but that proved difficult at the moment (and the one I bought got lost in the mail). Then at some point I realised that even though I'm more than capable of setting one up I just didn't feel like spending my time on it. So, I wanted something with UPnP, Spotify (not librespot), and Google Cast out of the box. But a CCA was out of the question since it doesn't do gapless playback. Then an NP5 showed up for sale locally so I just ponied up the extra money for it.
Haha sorry I went a bit overboard in the description there. I will give my impressions, but thus far I cannot tell any difference between the NP5 and streaming from a computer in the same room via a middling pro audio interface.Errr..... Fair enough.
Fair Play! Appreciate the clarificationHaha sorry I went a bit overboard in the description there. I will give my impressions, but thus far I cannot tell any difference between the NP5 and streaming from a computer in the same room via a middling pro audio interface.
If there's room for improvement, it's downstream since I'm using the internal DAC of my monitor controller (I'd bet that my CA DACmagic 100 is better but I'm short of outlets) and a cheap toslink cable that I'm not confident does it's job to spec (planning to buy a Van Damme cable, just haven't gotten around to it).
My "no hifi zone" comment is just opposed to my main system which is full blown EWA cult.
A sub. What took me so long?
Just ordered the APEX upgrade for my dCS Rossini DAC
It should make a nice self-offered Christmas cum Birthday present
Beat the price rise was indeed the reason behind the recent order - I'd been waiting for closure on an ongoing repair-notrepair situation with a power amp that smoked on me twice. But I've resolved that as a "don't throw good money after bad" situation - there are several other US-made amps of the same brand and model in need of repair here in France so I'm rather pessimistic about how valid a 3k-4k-5k€ repair would be (more to do with the design than the service tech).
I tried many many of these cables myself and concluded that this exact one IS the overall best sounding/price ratio for medium and high grade audiophile kits. I bought them used as well so even more true.3 days ago I ordered a Chord Clearway rca interconnect.
I've been using a Chord Cobra 3 cable for the best part of the last 10 years and never really felt a curiosity to try other ic's. (same with speaker cables)
I'm so glad that last week apparently I felt just about enough curiosity to try the Chord Clearway, and although my system is quite humble, the improvements are very noticable!
The sound has become more open/transparent and instruments are much easier to follow individually. Even when listening to music on Spotify (320kbs) the difference is obvious.
Long story short,...it's a keeper!
I recently purchased the Atoll IN300 amp. After a lot of testing of various offerings this was the one that made me sit up and go wow!! Smooth, detailed, fast tight bass, massive soundstage and an onboard dac which is very good, just better than anything I have had before. Being able to test at home fairly easily helped me make the right decision. I am considering one of their cd transports, if its anything like the sound signature of the amp it will right up my street sonically