Strictly for fans of Audio Note UK (all things Audio Note UK)

A re-cap:

M5 Phono Sig + Paladin = OK (having heard Kessi's set-up, I can attest that there is full volume range in use and no over gain induced hiss or other noise)
M5 Phono + Vindicator = OK
M6 Phono + Jinro Shochu = OK
----
- M3 Phono + Quest Silver = Too much gain (me)
- M5 Phono Sig + Quest Silver = Too much gain (user: Kessi)
- M3 Phono + Empress Silver = Too much gain (user: Marchino)
- M6 Phono + Empress Silver = Too much gain (user: Richard Austen)

And one person I know says M5 Phono + Quest Silvers = no problem.

I'm taking all are normal gain versions run into AN-E or AN-J. Aren't low gain versions meant to be used >100 dB horn speakers?
So, does Empress and Quests have too much internal gain and companied with pre-amps gain it goes overboard? I don't know enough of gain as a subject to know or understand the technical side.

 

M3 Phono + Quest Silver = At my dealer = no issues
M6 Phono + Quest Silver = At my dealer = no issues
M3 Phono + Empress Silver = At my dealer = no issues
M6 Phono + Empress Silver = At my dealer = no issues

Maybe the person building them mixed up building a high gain and low gain version. The high gain version is supposed to have the resistors in place at the factory - they forgot to put it in because maybe the low gain version doesn't have them. So you get your normal gain amp without the resistors? Clearly, something was amiss at the build stage otherwise it would affect all of them and it does not. And it does not appear to be a preamp problem because running other amplifiers is totally fine - I have 250-watt class D monoblocks and there is no excessive gain or noise at all - it is clearly an issue with "some" monoblocks which means someone 'likely' forgot to put the resistors in when building them.

I doubt this is a common issue otherwise the dealers would go crazy having to deal with irate customers every time they make a sale. Not to mention having their service department having to fix them all the time.

Though yes it is frustrating when $20,000USD+ worth of separates have problems that don't exist on $199 AVRs from Best Buy. The main thing is they resolve it quickly and hopefully it doesn't continue to happen.

The M3 and M6 on my Empress Silvers both sound terrific now. I only contemplate the Jinro because - well - it has a beefier more full-bodied sound. There is a part of me that would like to audition the Neiro because it's level 4 and might be around the same price of the level 3 Jinro - so...But my dealer doesn't have the Neiro.

 

Perhaps but no quality control? I would think each unit goes through testing from someone other than the person building it prior to it leaving the shop.

 

Every piece that is made in the factory has a full worksheet of manufacture and is always a 2 part process of the job completion and inspection and then a final run in testing stage where the unit is soak tested and documented for all operational parameters.
Personally, listing combinations of equipment and shortcomings is somewhat out of context without listing manufacture year, what attenuators used, has it been modified or secondhand, what if any additional information might give clues as to issues, anything else. The gain profile was changed in the new attenuators due to the old attenuators reaching a reasonable level at 9-9.30, always with the standard input power amps from AN. Using the low gain power amps would see 12 for the same volume level. With the new attenuators and low gain, that would become 2.30.
There is no systemic fault, if you have an issue, ask your dealer and they should have an answer.
AN is one of the most commonly modified brands available and buying second hand is always a risk if you don’t know what you are looking at and most modifications are butcher jobs at best, I have lots of photos of stuff that is just plain stupid and done with no skill and minimal knowledge. AN certainly can’t be held responsible for that.

 

I'm not trying to bash Audio Note in this regard, I have not have any problems with AN gear in ten years before this. Beautifully built and sounding stuff.

But as this gain structure problem brought similar experiences of other customers, figuring out what is going, I think is good for Audio Note as well. At least for future reference.

There might've been some short period in manufacturing when things weren't right like Richard speculated. If so we can assume that the issue has not been unknown to them; ie. Marchino receiving resistors from AN to fix a problem (that shouldn't have existed in a first place). Richard getting his M6 + Empress combo fixed, surely his dealer contacted AN about it to let them know?

I understand that if such manufacturing mishap (or a gain mis-match in design between new pre-amps and power amps) happened Audio Note would've not wanted to make a big announcement out of it. It could've snowballed in the online forums and/or everybody calling in their serial numbers to check if their gear is affected etc.

But if there was a mistake made, or a gain structure change that affects many customers; a closed group announcement and instructions to AN dealers would've been the way to go. But apparently that was not done either as my dealer haven't got that kind of memo, nor do you Finn refer to such information being relayed to you?

What it has lead to, is us speculating things online. What it can/could've lead to, as not all sales goes through dealers and people have bake-offs or loan equipment from other AN users; experiences of Audio Note gear not playing together, which can again be brought to online forums as 'truths' as the experience was truth to that user.

In today's connected world, being open and owning to mistakes (and fixing them) is the way to go.

Regarding of products being modified;
Out of those examples that were unearthed in two days on this forum;
I know for sure Kessi's M5 Phono Sig + Quest Silvers were unmodified.
We can safely assume Richards M6 + Empress Silver were unmodified as well.
Marchino's M3 + Empress Silver; unknown.
My on loand Quest Silver; unmodified for sure (dealer loan). My M3 Phono, even as bought second hand it went to Audio Note Lithuania's factory for a check, before I purchased it and having an almost unhealthy interest in Audio Note gear innards, (and having built ANK kits Dac and RIAA) I can see no modifications done to it (if it is not standard, that have to been an custom order from AN factory or then a very skilled modder has done the work and it went unnoticed in factory check)

 

Anyone here tried AN speakers with a Devialet amplifier ?

I was a little surprised reading Devialet's site. As it is indicated, using the "SAM speaker profile adapter" with an AN-K makes it go down to 14 Hz on the track Angel by Massive Attack (48 Hz without this SAM magic trick).

 

Hi, Finn I just think something happened either a mistake at the plant or something happened during shipping - the latter there isn't much anyone can do about.

My M3 Phono was new and had no issues with my other power amps.

When the Empress Silver 6sN7 version (normal gain arrived) the sound was deafening at 8 o'clock with a very loud buzzing hiss. Elephant sent out a tech to add a resistor to the M3 (it was the 23-step version) but that did nothing. They took back the Empress Silvers and fixed it very fast -they said under an hour. The Empress came back and were/are perfect. No noise at all and nothing muffled or fuzzy. Terrific.

Forums make things out to be bigger because more people post negative experiences than positive ones. So if they sell 100 of something and four people have a problem those 4 will be on a forum and then it seems like everyone is having an issue.

Still, something has gone wrong and I don't think it comes down to modifications. I remember something like 18 years ago AN had major problems with a particular capacitor and Peter took them back and replaced them for free, even out of warranty, because the caps were prone to something (maybe humidity) that doesn't exist in England.

Here in Hong Kong for example it is very high humidity(and a lot of dust) and after a while the M3 volume pots "crackle" when you turn the knob. It's pretty loud "between the steps." The fix for this is to turn the knobs all the way up and down a half dozen times before you use it to shake off the dust. This problem does not exist on the M1 style volume pots. There is no noise once you have locked in the stepped attenuator it only crackles while turning the knob. My Wharfedale e70 Vanguard speakers have attenuators and do the same thing - though in Vancouver this wasn't noticeable until the speakers were around 25 years old.

I think people who know about these style pots know that this is not a problem - and it sounds a lot better than the M1 volume pot but I think there are folks out there who may not know and might be a bit irritated if they own the preamp for 3 months and it starts to crackle. Then the dealer has to explain it to them - but they will say "Why does your 3-month-old $25,000 preamp crackle but my 30-year-old Denon AVR for $399 make no noise? It seems like this will be a headache for AN and their dealers. Since it appears not to be a headache - one can probably assume it's not that big of an issue - and if it is an issue it would be in Hong Kong and they sell the most AN.

Like I said - it doesn't bother me - I traded my M3 up for an M6 knowing I'll get this crackle on my M6 (and I do), but I know this is the nature of their stepped attenuator in this particular climate. I also know the Foam surrounds will never make it 25 years as they would in Vancouver - the humidity will take a toll on them here.

I know several dealers here - they get a lot of Shindo, Einstein, Line Magnetic returns for breaking down - Parasound offers a 5-year warranty in the US but only 1 year in Hong Kong!

 

Hmm, I would take that with a big grain of salt. Basically SAM must be EQ, and while that may force some extra bass out of a speaker, it won't rewrite the laws of physics, and I would think that this would either be rather dangerous for woofers' health or compromise overall sound quality.

However, even without SAM the K actually gives the impression of going lower than the 50 Hz stated on AN's website.

 

my stuff was bought brand new, not second hand and stil it had a hum a deaf person coult notice so I guess no one in the factory checked it well otherwise they must have heart the hum I should think.

 

So I gather then you've never had the experience of a piece of gear acting wonky in your home and taking it to the dealer where it performed perfectly fine? This seems to be the norm for me regardless of the brand of gear. Every listening environment is different, the relative purity of incoming electricity, environmental RFI and EMI all different. And triodes are going to hum typically at least somewhat my, non AN, 2a3 amp has some hum but it's low enough in level to be tolerable.

 

I can't say anything about your experiences, in my case, my brand new combo M3 Phono plus Empress Silver also sounded bad at the dealers place when he took it back to install the resistors. A huge hum doesn’t have anything to do whit a listening environment.
I am aware of the fact that AN gear make little noice / hum of what you like to call it but shouldn’t be annoying hearable from the listening position.
You buy expensive gear to listen to music not the hum. I had AN gear for over 10 years and still have an CD 4.1X and a the M3 phono so I know what it’s capable of.

 

Maybe a ground loop issue? The same equipment in one room can have a ground loop hum but not in another room. This is due I believe to differences in the wall outlet wiring. If that’s the case, a chassis ground buffer resistor will eliminate the ground loop hum.

 

Hiss and hum accompanied of no usable range in volume is more akin to excessive gain?

I got similar hiss and hum (albeit little lower than with current problem) by turning Meishus volume to max (with no music playing). That's tube and other electrical noise that with normal volume/gain would be inaudible, but with 'full throttle', becomes very audible.

Ground loop has low 50Hz/60Hz purring sound:

 

I have a dedicated audio group for analogue and an other for digital plus extra grounding installed. This unit was the only unit which had this hum problem ever in my room and also at the dealers place it had the same problem. After the dealer installed the resistors which Peter Q had send me the hum was far less and hardly noticeable.
of course everything is possible and there can be many reasons but I believe in my case it was due to the Empress and not my listening environment.

 

You are right but in my case there was massive hum even with volume low. I am aware of all this and that is part of the charm whit tube gear I think until it’s overpowering the music.
I am happy it was the same story at my dealers place so it wasn’t just me and I believe some others had exactly the same problem.
You have to experience yourself to get a good picture. It’s like when you try a child to explain burning heat, it’s very hard until it put the finger in the flame and then it knows.

 

And just wanted to say; there is nothing awful or unheard about boutique brand doing a mistake. We are all humans, even the best of us do mistakes.
Even huge automotive companies with tightly controlled manufacturing processes have to from time to time recall thousands cars because of manufacturing, part or software faults.
The way mistake is handled, towards the customers, has to be impeccable when product being sold is in premium price range.

 

Having lived through nearly 10
years of chasing down hum, trying every solution imaginable, we finally discovered through the help of our dealer that the hum was caused by the AN amplifiers. Thankfully, she took a long drive to hear what I had been describing/troubleshooting for a couple of years.

It took a few months to get everything sorted, but the system is now very, very quiet, and the amplifiers have never sounded better.

So, yeah, sometimes the problem lies within the component.

 

Did the dealer tell you what the problem was with the amp and what was done to fix it?

 

The dealer sent the amps to be evaluated by factory authorized service.

When the problems were identified, she informed us every step of the way what was discovered and what was done to correct the problems.

 

Whilst I’m a fan of AN gear (I have enough of it), all these stories are quite alarming. There shouldn’t be any issues coming out of a factory, whether it be a £500 amp or a £100k amp. A manufacturing company at this level should have more stringent quality control in place if they are having issues. If what others are saying about resistors not being in place in certain amps, that shouldn’t even be able to happen.
I will say though that I have been very happy personally with my equipment, other than the volume pots and selectors on both my Oto phono se and my Oto Sig which are utter crap. They seem to be the cheapest of the cheap, with intermittent drop outs and scratch noises when turned, these have been repaired at the factory at a decent price, but really shouldn’t need to within two or three years of purchase.

It does make me consider other companies that make similar equipment using similar foo components when contemplating future upgrades. Saying that, a pair of E Spe-He will still be my next speakers .

Just please for the love of God, sort the pots and selector switches on the Oto.

 

This was 100% true with my oto as well. It was changed three times and has since been working trouble free (less than one years so far).

 

The new AN dealer in Chicago showed at Axpona audio show this year. I didn't attend but I look forward to visiting the dealer at some point. Interesting they showcased the AN-E/D ($6,400) in the room.

Link to Stereophiles room report: The Audio Archon & Audio Note (UK) System

 

I was quite surprised to see the AN-E/D being shown you really don't see the D speakers very often but @Richard Austen indicated in the Axpona thread those are Vincent Belanger's personal speakers.

 

I hadn't seen the thread yet, I'll check it out. You'd think AN would hook Vincent up with some higher level speakers. Perhaps a personal choice, now it's even more interesting.

 

When I met him in Copenhagen a couple of years ago, he told me that he has (had) Alnico E's. And shared my enthusiasm for them.