Vitus integrated amps surpass Naim 500 series?

[rontoolsie]

Some of the best systems I’ve heard have been Naim. Equally some of the worst systems I’ve heard have also been Naim.

And THAT is the absolute truth....I have heard some dismal 500-series systems. But then again I have heard an IXO based active system with a CD3 (NOT CDS3) source into some active Credos that sounded fantastic.
Moral....never upgrade your electronics until you have looked after the room acoustics and the mains feed. You do not NEED $15,000 mainz cables, although they can also weave seamlesssly into a great system.

 

[ryder]

A lot of good points raised here which contribute to the excellent exchanges. I particularly find the discussion on the term "neutrality" interesting and agree with BOTH Woodface and Duckworp. I used to share the same thought as Woodface about the original recorded source or signal being manipulated and altered by sound engineers or producers in the recording studio with equalizers. But then again, I agree with Duckworp too.

Back to the topic, Vitus replacing Naim 500, and Audionet. I am sure all are good. Interesting that the RI-101 Mk2 is already out and it's claimed to bridge the gap between the its predecessors (RI-100 and 101 mk1) and SIA-025 / SIA-030. At a price of £13,600 I am convinced it must be something special.

 

[ryder]

Moral....never upgrade your electronics until you have looked after the room acoustics and the mains feed. You do not NEED $15,000 mainz cables, although they can also weave seamlesssly into a great system.

I couldn't agree with you more on this one. Tell me more about the $15,000 mains cables. I've already invested in $8,000 lately in Acrolink Mexcel cables and share the same experience.

 

[Hound]

I dont know, but maybe its because the vitus is more clinical than the naim, this shows more on very good hires quality tracks, that when you then switch over to something thats not so good, the difference is greater and so i pick up on it more and so found it more off a problem.
Like i said this made me just really want to play quality recording, this may off changed over weeks or months but i didn't want to make the call and regret it.
My main source is DCS rossini and clock and melco for rips, and fact 12 speakers

 

[Miss Ariel]

Hi Guys,

Really enjoying reading your thoughts - experience of Vitus gear.Only heard the SIA 025 at the Hi FI News Windsor Show in 2018 and really liked it.

Thought this video would be of interest.

 

[Mike Reed]

One of the great things about Naim is that they keep their models constant which helps maintain values, apart from the exception of the DR introduction which has lowered the value of non-DR gear.

Some valid points in the text of your post 55. The above DR devaluation, in effect, is a departure for Naim as it's not a case change, of which there have only been 3 in 40 odd years(?) and nor is it a model upgrade.

I have to day, though, reading Hound's and other posts, that having an expensive machine which effectively takes a hour plus to sing properly is a disappointment. Although I used to run my Naim 24/7, I'd not be happy doing that with a Vitus or similar (or indeed nowadays with advanced years). Stand-by is fine, but not if it doesn't assist warm-up sufficiently. Wonder if the same applies to Sugden or other class A jobbies.

Despite having to fire everything up (incl speakers and CDP) nowadays, my valve power amps are stabilised and singing sufficiently after 15 minutes. I'm therefore surprised that (a) the Vitus (only the Vitus?) gets so hot and (b) takes so long and (c) consumes so much power, but then, I'm a novice with class A amplification, albeit recognising its s.q. credentials.

 

[Mike Reed]

Moral....never upgrade your electronics until you have looked after the room acoustics and the mains feed.

D'you mean dedicated radial circuits, Ron? If so, I'd agree, though my experience has led to there being more benefit to Naim and possibly other s/s with toroidal trannies, but not necessarily to valved amplification (or sources?). From being a total convert, I'm now questioning that it's a panacea for all hifi. Obv. no negatives, however and some practical usefulness too.

 

[duckworp]

Hi Guys,

Really enjoying reading your thoughts - experience of Vitus gear.Only heard the SIA 025 at the Hi FI News Windsor Show in 2018 and really liked it.

Thought this video would be of interest.

Thanks for the link. He clearly likes the amp! I agree, it is simply stunning.

 

[Mike Reed]

Thought this video would be of interest.

Yes it was. Rather too long in the tracks and of course of limited value through a desktop and crappy old Sennheisers. However, I believe I might have heard a difference on the class AB to A bit. I think it would have been better to switch between AB to A repetitively on shorter snatches of music. Didn't listen to the mode differences as I get confused easily !

What an interesting and useful thread this is.

 

[duckworp]

I have to day, though, reading Hound's and other posts, that having an expensive machine which effectively takes a hour plus to sing properly is a disappointment.

Personally this is not my experience. I find the difference between class AB and class A on the SIA025 and the SIA030 to be very subtle, and the amp is left in class AB 24/7, so it is ready instantly with no warm up. Vitus claim it takes 30 mins to get to full Class A which has been my experience. If you watch the video in the link a few posts up the reviewer plays Kraftwerk in Class AB and then Class A. I know it is recorded on a microphone and listening through a PC is not ideal but through a PC there is literally no difference detectable, which at least shows how the real world differences are not that huge.

The temperature is not that hot - I can easily put my hand on the casework of the 025 and the 030 in Class A.

Edit: I have just read your post @Mike Reed and you did hear a difference between Class A and AB - you have better ears than me

 

[Darren L]

Wonder if the same applies to Sugden or other class A jobbies.

IME the Sugden amps sound good from initial switching on and really come on song within a few minutes, they do run hot but no hotter than a good class A valve amp.

 

[markharro]

As the OP of this thread it's been great to see the discussion generated. I don't have any background in electronics so can someone offer a quick summary of class A and class AB and explain why the former is better? And I take it that the Vitus 101 mk2 is still constrained to AB and you need the more expensive SIA025 for the class A experience? thanks.

 

[duckworp]

As the OP of this thread it's been great to see the discussion generated. I don't have any background in electronics so can someone offer a quick summary of class A and class AB and explain why the former is better? And I take it that the Vitus 101 mk2 is still constrained to AB and you need the more expensive SIA025 for the class A experience? thanks.

You'll need an electronics person to answer the technical difference. Class A has less distortion and therefore will, in theory, sound the most natural. But it has low output and runs hot.

My favourite explanation for physics-illiterates like myself was from a poster called kodack10 on Reddit:

"Let me make a fitting analogy. Throw sound away and lets say that these amplifiers draw waves on a piece of paper instead of amplify sound. You scribble on a piece of paper, and the amp reproduces your scribble, on a much larger piece of paper.

A class A amplifier can reproduce your original stroke the closest. Your nice rounded letters, are nice and rounded still, just larger. The downside though is it creates a lot more heat doing this, which makes it harder to build a larger version to draw your letters even bigger. So you mostly find class A on lower wattage systems where clarity really matters, and efficiency and heat don't. You could build a really powerful one, but it would suck a lot of power, produce a lot of heat, and probably require a fork lift to move it.

Class AB on the other hand does the same thing class A does. You write something down, it accurately reproduces your handwriting and pen strokes, but in the middle of each letter you write, there is a slight wiggle in it's version, that wasn't there in your version. It mostly is accurate, but that one little point in the middle of each stroke has just a little hitch in it. If you can live with that though, it's hardly noticable, and it uses far less power than class A, creates far less heat than class A, and because of this you can make AB amps really big. Really big and still efficient, and not weigh a ton. So AB makes sense when you need to get loud, and you don't need 100% perfection, just 99% perfection.

Then you have class D. You write your sentence and feed it in, and class D makes bigger versions of your letters but it doesn't draw the letters at all. It prints them like a dot matrix printer, using millions of tiny little dots to reproduce the lines of your writing. And it does this fast, and it does this with almost no heat and almost no wasted energy. It can be almost 100% efficient. Granted the way it writes out your sentence is not with a pen and paper, but by re-constituting your writing with dots, it mostly looks like your original letters, just a little rougher around the edges, but you would have to get really close to it in order to tell, like maybe even a magnifying glass (or an osciliscope).

There are also differences in the quality of each class. One class A may be super accurate, another one may be really cheaply made, with more noise, and maybe less clarity even though the design of the amp is stellar, the parts it's made with aren't.

And by extension, maybe a peach tree class D amp is made super well, and the dots are so small you'll never notice it's not written with a pen. And because it can be 100% efficient, it can be tiny, powerful, and run cool."


To answer your other question: the RI-101 is Class AB only. The SIA-025 is Class A upto 25 Watts output and Class AB from 25 Watts and upto 125W.

 

[MichaelC]

An interesting thread. Ultimately we all hear things differently and have different preferences.

There is a lot of kit out there, in fact too much to be reasonably able to try it all out let alone a targeted range. For what it is worth I have listened to Naim, Esoteric, Krell, Audio Research and Audionet along the way. I can understand why some prefer Esoteric and or Audione, ultimately I found them too clinical for my liking. I was not taken by Krell and Audio Research disappointed me, I had expected so much more.

Briefly on the subject of Vitus, there is a slightly different character, perhaps a mild creaminess or, I simply can’t explain. Tremendous soundstage. Does the detail I heard from the Esoteric/Audionet. Starts and stops on a dime. Need twenty or so minutes to come on song, think one side of a record. Runs warm, but not hot (only really noticeable in the height of summer, but not to the point of causing upset). Downsides - heavy, very heavy. Mind you, not as bad as shifting the Wilson’s bass unit crates (that must have been pure comedy gold for those watching three grown men struggle)!!! Incidentally, class a/b to drive the Wilsons fully. The menu, on a number of occasions I have got lost in the menu, same complaint as for the Wadia!

 

[Woodface]

Class A is not inherently better than AB. How the amplifier is designed is the most important.

 

[Hound]

Personally this is not my experience. I find the difference between class AB and class A on the SIA025 and the SIA030 to be very subtle, and the amp is left in class AB 24/7, so it is ready instantly with no warm up. Vitus claim it takes 30 mins to get to full Class A which has been my experience. If you watch the video in the link a few posts up the reviewer plays Kraftwerk in Class AB and then Class A. I know it is recorded on a microphone and listening through a PC is not ideal but through a PC there is literally no difference detectable, which at least shows how the real world differences are not that huge.

The temperature is not that hot - I can easily put my hand on the casework of the 025 and the 030 in Class A.

Edit: I have just read your post @Mike Reed and you did hear a difference between Class A and AB - you have better ears than me

Well if you can't really tell the difference then, for one its not worth you having the sia range, might as well just have the r101, plus as you say, you can't really tell the difference, how come you are so sure it only takes 30 minutes?
As said for me 30 minutes was the absolute minimum and in reality it likes much more and got better the longer you left it on.
As for heat these things give off, i at first had it sitting on still points on the floor infront off my rack, i still had my 500dr in the rack, on but not connected as wanted to compare them, so didnt want the 500 to cool down, anyway for the first time ever, i heard its fans start up, due to the heat coming off the vitus, that was infront off it , but still about 200mm away, over the warm summer days we had this year, after using it for about 4 hours and leaving it on, it heated up a 6m x 5 m room by 4 degrees, not bad lol, and certainly made the room more uncomfortable.
I believe the 030 with its bigger case and heat management doesn't get so warm to the touch, but i guess it still gives off a lot off heat.

Class A is like you running your car flat out all the time, even if you are only going 5 miles an hour, thats why they get hot and run hot

 

[Cyclopse]

If you can afford it the Vitus class A is where the magic is. How the music flows and the 3D sound staging.

I leave mine during the week. Just switch to A/B mode and consumption drops to 50 watts. Looking at the internals of the 025 it looks like nearly all transformer. This is the UI transformer, how many other companies use these?

I moved over from valves because of the heat and unreliability. Another Vitus strength is the rich tone, full bodied like valves. Pay attention to foundations and you can increase the performance further. I have not experienced any heat issues. After a full day in class A the heat sinks are warm but not hot.

I have had the SIA-025 for three years and love the reliability and one box solution as well as the sound of course.

 

[duckworp]

Well if you can't really tell the difference then, for one its not worth you having the sia range, might as well just have the r101, plus as you say, you can't really tell the difference, how come you are so sure it only takes 30 minutes?

I hear a difference but it is not that different to my ears. Whatever, it is definitely worth having the SIA range even if it had no Class A. I had the RI and the SIA in my room simultaneously and the SIA025 in AB mode is way ahead of the RI-100, way ahead, a much richer deeper sound and soundstage, completely enveloping. And the SIA30 is another beast entirely, in A or AB mode.

What I am saying is that you should not be put off Vitus class A amps thinking you have to wait a long while to hear them sounding great. The SIA025 and SIA030 sound wonderful from the get go and will just go on getting better after 30 minutes.

 

[Woodface]

I wonder how these compare with the Sugden Masterclass?

 

[Mike Reed]

Edit: I have just read your post @Mike Reed and you did hear a difference between Class A and AB - you have better ears than me

Ha ha! I doubt that unless you're an octogenarian with unbalanced and depleted hearing ! I did say that I believe I MIGHT have heard a difference.

The SIA-025 is Class A up to 25 Watts output and Class AB from 25 Watts and up to 125W.

Must admit, this bit I don't get. 25 quality watts into most speakers is a heck of a lot (maybe apart from peaks), and surely it would be an extreme head-banging event with a very insensitive speaker to actually invoke the transition from A to AB.

Just switch to A/B mode and consumption drops to 50 watts.

I moved over from valves because of the heat and unreliability. Another Vitus strength is the rich tone, full bodied like valves.

Any idea of the wattage running class A? (I imagine it stays constant regardless of volume.) Which valves did you gravitate from, b.t.w., as I'm surprised that the Vitus creates that much less heat. Think my mono's are around 200 watts (a guess 'cos I can't be bothered to look for the manual), but of course there are two of them. Maybe the two class A mono's, not yet mentioned in this thread, would be contenders for a slight premium !