Here is an example of Martin Colloms on digital products "a 40 is considered to be subjectively 'twice as good' as one scoring 20." The Colloms Sound Quality Ratings Explained His digital products ratings Colloms Sound Quality Ratings: Digital Audio
My post was pretty much a joke. hence the hyperbole of being a musician and if i say I kicks as$ it kicks as$. but in all reality I could care less what anyone writes about anything. In the end it’s my ears and my experience. Same goes for guitars , violins, and pianos all which I played and been intimate with so anyone is welcome to say a piece of gear which I like is ****e. Doesn’t matter to me But because someone X said it means nothing to me. Not like I’m gonna love a piece of gear then read a review which says it’s ****e and I’ll sell it. nope. cheers
This guy says something about an Audio Note preamp in his review of the HPA4, something about the latter sounding as good as the former, or some shiz like that:
Audio is one of those things where no one can recreate the exact same experience. If you drive five $30,000 Sedans in Seattle and I drive the same five in Vancouver and assuming the roads are in good condition then we will probably come to agreement on the cars. Pretty close. But Audio is nowhere close. I have auditioned MBL and YG Acoustics at two shows. At the first show I ranked them bottom 2. At the next show I ranked the the best 2. Bryston amplifiers don't sound good on my speakers. On any of my speakers, but it sounded quite fine on PMC and Axiom speakers. So depending what the system is will depend on how much one likes the Bryston. I take a more system approach. While the Bryston sounded better on PMC I preferred the overall setup with the SET and HE speakers. In other words what is the overall system synergy? With high power SS amplifiers they tend to be able to drive far more speakers. So ranking an individual amplifier like my old OTO is tough because it's a 4 watt undistorted amplifier and so it needs a very narrow band of speakers to be able to drive properly. In other words it will suck with a Revel or B&W. My old Arcam or my current Rotel would crush it. But on the easy to drive speakers the Arcam and Rotel are downright unlistenable. Tastes also change over time. Hearing ability may also require a little extra when folks get into their 70s. We'll all be there hopefully. And yes, always buy with your own ears not the technicals BS. I liked Benchmark with a speaker called Studio Electric several years ago.
Hi Helom. Yes he has used his Audio Note as a reference for a long while comparing it against 10k+ components. Not bad for a 25 year old integrated amp for $2,000. Interestingly, the Soro is often regarded as their lesser sounding amp. So when something is as good as ANs worst it is still good but meh. The strange thing is the guy has modified it so we don't know what has been done. The AN amp has no preouts. It is only an integrated amp and it houses the M1 preamp and P2SE power amp in one box with a shared power supply. Separating the two would still share one power supply. I have the Audio Note OTO which also uses the M1 preamp. And I am reviewing the standalone M1 preamp and it is VASTLY better than the OTO or SORO. It's an odd video. He likes the SORO that most AN fans don't like but then not really so he did major surgery on it to get it to the point where he feels it's still better than all 5 times more expensive stuff he has tried and that the particular Benchmark only equals it in spite of being 20+ years newer. I'm not so sure it is the ringing endorsement I was expecting. The M1 preamp is like $2700 with its own power supply. Maybe someone can just compare that. It's not exactly a bank buster.
Yes but I try to no longer comment on gear I have not heard three times in three different locations with different equipment. The exception to this is audio shows where my job is to just report the sound I heard under those conditions. Precisely because I have had rooms that I hear that sounded awful and then the next show was outstanding. And the three locations can't suck. They were selling Benchmark for a time a while back at Fortress - which is Hong Kong's version of Best Buy so that is pointless because of the environment. I think they realized it wasn't a good environment to sell their products and pulled out - so did Bryston. Fortress is now selling Esoteric, B&W, KEF, Rega, Arcam, Amphion, Cyrus which makes sense - more digital and more "looks" products. I did audition them at a building in MongKok a while ago but I didn't have my music with me so it was just a passing audition. Due to the Pandemic - I will be teaching half days for the year so I will get off from work around 1 pm so if I have the chance I will be out at various dealers to give them a go. Please understand though that I am on a number of forums and every year there is always some product that posters say is the best ever and will blow away everything else - from Antique Sound lab in 1999 to nOhr speakers to MSB to KEF LS-50s to Dan D'agostino amps to Parasound to Prima Luna etc. The problem with the hype is that you can misjudge the product - you may be too hard on the product when it invariably doesn't transcend to a heavenly out-of-body experience. You expect the best and when it falls short - you say - that stunk - when in reality it only stunk in relation to God but it's actually really very good. The good news is I liked Benchmark at an Audio Show years ago with a Speaker Brand called Studio Electric - an underrated little speaker company I might add. I also liked a Studio Electric room with their amps but with a Benchmark DAC. This was the Studio Electric speaker - Our website went through a change and it seems a lot of our show coverage has been deleted. If you do a search you will find Benchmark and Studio Electric sharing rooms at audio shows - it was an excellent match and I am pretty sure I listed the room as a top-five under $10,000 (based on the speaker's price). The speakers look weird but they had a real nice sound with Benchmark. I am sure Benchmark and Studio Electric have improved since then as well. Here's a Benchmark Studio Electric facebook post Log into Facebook
I owned the AHB2 for a while. At first I thought it was amazing. Incredible clarity, low noise floor, dynamic range etc but after a while I found it so sterile and boring and couldn't wait to be rid of it. Admittedly I only paired it with the pre-amp of my Yamaha A-S1100 but it's still a fine pre-amp and I'm a big fan of the Yamaha voicing. There's no doubt that this is a seriously impressive piece of kit from a scientific viewpoint but it's really not for everyone, like anything in HiFi.
That seems to be what the Benchmark products are specifically designed to avoid - "voicing" or additive colorations. Not for every audiophile for sure.
It’s good to read that you didn’t show up here just to $#!+ on Benchmark products… But if that is your intent, then by all means, have at it. I’ve owned enough gear by now to know what I like and don’t really care if there are naysayers. I for one have difficultly returning to tube gear, class A SET or otherwise, having now lived with amplifiers of practically zero distortion. I still understand why tubes appeal to others though. I swapped my Allnic tube pre back into the system last night following an hour with the LA4. Initially the euphoric warmth of the tubes was a nice change, but it wasn’t very long before fatigue started to set in. Not once had I experienced fatigue with the Allnic pre prior to owning the Bel Canto or LA4. So why is it suddenly fatiguing now? I’d wager my brain is now accustomed to the zero audible distortion of the Benchmark stuff. A couple years ago I wouldn’t have remotely considered Benchmark’s products, always thinking objective performance is meaningless. These days, I’m leaning in the other direction more and more, and as a result, I’ve been thinking less about the gear and just enjoying the best sound I’ve heard from my speakers. I hope you get the same satisfaction from your beautiful AN gear. Admittedly, I wish the Benchmark stuff had a more AN-like aesthetic, because honestly, I think it’s pretty darn ugly. Cheers
Here’s the thing man. And with all due respect and hopefully no offense. you are obviously biased with the audio note gear, so it’s tough to assess your opinions on gear other than that. Cheers
Hearing the difference between say o.01% distortion and 0.001 on speakers that probably have at least 1% distortion?
It's about the tone and realism for me at the end of the day. Does the B/M system sound let you connect with the music? Maybe the Allnic has too much tube effect?
Well he’s hearing it and he is also been doing this hobby for a long time , so I suspect what he is hearing is true. And why many actually prefer SS over tubes.
Yes, I have zero problem connecting to the music. I fact, it’s easier to connect as I suffer much less fatigue. It’s the closest I’ve come to imitating a live non-amplified acoustical performance in my listening room. Also, unlike a lot of gear out there, it doesn’t impart any amount of sameness to every song. The Allnic is a great tube pre. It has no glaring weaknesses and is mostly neutral - very smooth class A SET sound with excellent dynamics. It’s just that I can no longer listen to it without some fatigue eventually setting in, even though there is no obvious distortion to identify. It’s like whatever distortion it does have is bothersome on a subconscious level.
I believe David McPherson of Studio Electric designed the Benchmark SMS1 speaker. Still have the SMS1 and I do enjoy it. Goes well with the AHB2. Just need to get the LA4 soon.
That was my logic: why would .0099% distortion matter when the speakers are producing ~1% distortion? But then I considered that many high performance speakers produce less than 1% at volumes under 85db or so, and most of that distortion occurs in the bass freqs where it’s not as obvious. Where distortion is more audible and problematic is in the high and upper-mid freqs. It’s there that I believe the human ears must be far more sensitive to small amounts of distortion, at least it seems mine are. I suspect that’s the reason why my speakers now sound as though their decent soft dome tweeters were swapped for nice beryllium units. Also, I now believe that distortion must be accumulative in most cases, especially in high freqs where phase anomalies between components are less likely to cancel it out some.
Yes you probably are hearing those differences but I doubt it has anything to do with ultra low distortion.It might be more to do with phase shift or some other factors. My Bakoon amplifier has extraordinarily pure treble.Anybody who has reviewed Bakoon products has commented on the clarity and purity of the treble and used words like tintinnabulation to describe it.Yet they are not especially low distortion amplifiers because they do not use any negative feedback. It also could be that you have just discovered a preamp/power amp pairing that are electrically compatible.That is a much underestimated consideration in extracting optimal sound quality.You never quite know which preamp is going to work with which power amp. As regards valve preamps finding the right valves is often critical to achieving optimal sound quality.The meshplate 300Bs I use in my Supratek preamp have much better treble than the standard ones.
No tube gear I’ve heard can match the combined resolution and smoothness of the AHB2 and LA4. I’m not saying there isn’t any out there but probably none that I will ever be able to afford. There’s a lot of speculation on this thread surrounding the sound quality of the Benchmark gear when there really needn’t be. Both Benchmark and Music Direct offer in-home trial periods. Put it on the plastic and take a test drive. If not to your taste, MD will gladly take them back since they’re flying off their shelves.
That's totally fine - I have often said myself that I am an AN Fanboy and everyone whether they like to admit it or not is biased. I note that Audio Note made me a fanboy because when I sat in the room and listened it beat the hell out of everything else in the store by leaps and bounds. Brands that I went in there to buy that got rave reviews. But if you are on a number of forums you see some other fanboys - fans of Horn speakers or electrostatics where no box speaker will do. Fans of high-power SS amps or SET amps abound. What bothers me is when reviewers tout a speaker in the press and then in person tell me - "oh the AN K is much better but it doesn't look good to be in the AN camp" - so this was a review of a major popular speaker brand but the reviewer actually thinks the AN K kicks its ass but doesn't want to appear biased to a brand that is "cultish." I'd rather tell you I am in the cult up front so at least you know my bias. And you do My gripe is when people try to pretend they're unbiased. Audio Note is a reference point to me so everything gets compared to that reference point. UHF magazine has a reference system and they judge everything against it. Most reviewers operate this way where the amp or source will be auditioned through their Wilson or Revel or B&W or Quad etc. All it really shows is how did the amp faired with that particular set of speakers. But as I noted earlier - Bryston when I had them at home I ran them with my 95dB sensitive horn tweeters Wharfedales and the Bryston pinched the speakers making them sound too "tight" and was then ear-bleeding bright. However, it cleared them up a lot as my Pioneer Elite at the time made it sound saggy and slow. The speaker was doing a fine job (still does) of revealing rather large differences in amplifiers. If I were a reviewer at that time the Bryston and the Elite would be complete failures. But the Bryston worked really well with PMC. Later I often saw them paired at audio shows and Bryston even made dedicated modules that connected to the back of PMC speakers. I'll leave with you this - first impressions have a major impact on one's views of a product. I have been to several dealers and audio shows and people's homes with Audio Note systems. And it's been a mixed bag from the boomy-coloured boxy sound to utter startling jaw-dropping transparent realism. Now if you hear the latter first then you would cut them slack on when it wasn't working. If you heard them when it was sucky then your motivation to hear them again is much lower. My first go-around with YG Acoustics and MBL was pretty piss poor. If I were not a reviewer who gets roped into going to audio shows I might still hold the view that those speakers are middling overpriced rubbish. Take even this thread - getting it back to Benchmark - you audition the Benchmark in some store using say B&W speakers - let's say you have never heard B&W speakers - you hear a kind of bright thin tinny sound. Now say you read a review that gave the B&W top marks class A, Editor's choice - 5 stars blah blah blah. Well, what you heard was bright thin tinny sound - you know from reading forums that lots of people say SS amplifiers sound bright thin and tinny. So you walk away from the audition blaming the Benchmark because all the surrounding information definitely supports that notion. PS I did the same thing for years myself. BUT - then after a few years you audition the same B&W speakers with dozens of amplifiers because your dealer friend carries B&W and dozens of amplifiers and then you hear that thinness tinniness whether you run Sim Audio, McIntosh, Audio Note, Cary, Jolida, Linn, Meridian, Classe, Rotel, Mark Levinson, Anthem, PS Audio, Ayre etc. So wait! If you go back over your notes you might then realize - hold the phone it was not the Benchmark! This speaker always sounds like this no matter what the amp because it's a stamped-on sonic signature of the speakers. You were blaming all these SS amplifiers when the speakers were the problem all along. Of course, this does also work the other way when the speakers are blamed in an audition when in fact the speaker was better able to show up the weakness of the particular amplifier or amplifier design. Take @Helom - he has had kind of the opposite take - he shelved his tube amps and prefers the SS amps but even here it depends on the SS amp and it depends on the tube amp and it depends on the speakers. I think most of us agree that SS class A/B amplifiers are more similar-sounding against other similarly priced Class A/B SS amps than tube amplifiers are to other tube amplifiers. There is a reason why people get so excitable about DBTs as they argue that it is rare that anyone can tell the difference between two properly operating SS power amplifiers of the same output power. In other words a $1500 500 Watt Rotel and a $10,000 500 watt Krell. Most likely the golden ears won't pass a DBT. That is not likely the case comparing an 8 watt 300b and 8 watt 2a3 - even from the same manufacturer using the same internal quality parts. Audition an Audio Note Quest and Empress - both around the same price using the same quality internals but you are very likely to prefer one over the other and you are very likely to be able to pick one out over the other in a DBT. So two things result - because SS amps sound more alike to each other it is assumed (wrongly) that it is more accurate. The assumption is wrong because while they differ from each other far less than tubes it doesn't mean that the SS sonic envelope as a whole is superior. Let's say that the colour egg-shell white is accurate. Let's say that tube amplifiers run the entire colour spectrum. SS may all be varying shades of blue. So they are all blue - light blue almost white to navy blue (coler analytical)- they all share the same sonic colour but none of them achieves any shade of white. Tube amplifiers have a far wider range including blue and including white. But also black orange and pink. If the tune amp you own is blue (maybe a KT120 or KT90) you will feel it sounds a little more SS. If it is orange/red (warmer fatter (45 Some EL34s, 300B) - the point is whether you choose the blue sound envelope or the orange-red sound envelope neither is egg-shell white because you don't actually know for sure what egg-shell white is because eggshells aren't all white. Maybe it's me but people overthink this stuff too much - why not have a few different amplifiers or sources or even speakers. If I won the lottery I'd have a bunch of rooms with all kinds of speakers and amplifiers. The great thing is that you can buy SS amps second-hand for next to nothing that measures great.
