20-Mar-2016, 23:32
(This post was last modified: 21-Mar-2016, 09:37 by Hifi_swlon.)
OK, it's staying. To be honest I've had nowhere near enough time to do hifi stuff this week, so partly it's staying because I need more time with it so will lose the option of returning it which is OK as it's an experiment after all. I also ordered a Aqvox USB cable so I could test if that made a difference, and it's just arrived. Well, if I'm believing this stuff - and I've at least convinced myself of a reasonably plausible science/technology logic - then using the Intona means introducing another USB cable into the chain, and the best other one I had was the green Audioquest.
Anyway, on to the important bit.... If I had to summarise so far, I'd say more analogue and less aggressive sound, with more detail. At one point I was really quite 'wowed', but on removal not as much as expected was lost, so clearly there's some expectation bias there (I guess I read too much and was rooting for it). That said, I'm certain it's doing something good, and will try and do a bit more listening in the evenings this week. One slight negative I perceive is a lessening of bass 'fullness' which from what I've read could well be due to removal of noise. What is this 'audiophile' curse of taking away much needed bass at every turn?
I'm not running Dirac at the moment due to the output selection problem, so would love to set that up again for these tests - think that's a few weeks off though.
If I sound a bit wishy-washy, that's partly due to the fact I've listened unusually little this past week, and on top of that we had a new sofa delivered which is much more padded, and I felt that made quite a difference to the rooms sound (better) before the Intona. I also took the system apart completely and moved it, and although I did tape out the speaker positions pretty well, I also made an adjustment to try and move the soundstage back a bit. Plus we had shutters installed on the window behind. So all-in-all, probably enough changes to the room to affect the sound quite a lot.
I'll try and report back again next week. Whatever happens, someone's gotta come up with an aftermarket case for it if it's staying, or it's going to have to go in the floor behind something. Intona say its for industrial use and not audio (despite their website bizarrely being pretty much purely about audio from what I can gather), but even so - the case is too big for what's inside, and plain old fashioned and ugly.
Lack of listening time on the Intona wasn't helped by the fact that this weekend I discovered Somafm 'groove salad' station on internet radio, and found it hard to pull myself away from that streamed through the chromecast audio - it's like it was programmed just for me and it sounds pretty good despite the 64Aac stream. I've got a feeling that's going to bring me far more pleasure than a USB cable and box of tricks.
Anyway, on to the important bit.... If I had to summarise so far, I'd say more analogue and less aggressive sound, with more detail. At one point I was really quite 'wowed', but on removal not as much as expected was lost, so clearly there's some expectation bias there (I guess I read too much and was rooting for it). That said, I'm certain it's doing something good, and will try and do a bit more listening in the evenings this week. One slight negative I perceive is a lessening of bass 'fullness' which from what I've read could well be due to removal of noise. What is this 'audiophile' curse of taking away much needed bass at every turn?
I'm not running Dirac at the moment due to the output selection problem, so would love to set that up again for these tests - think that's a few weeks off though. If I sound a bit wishy-washy, that's partly due to the fact I've listened unusually little this past week, and on top of that we had a new sofa delivered which is much more padded, and I felt that made quite a difference to the rooms sound (better) before the Intona. I also took the system apart completely and moved it, and although I did tape out the speaker positions pretty well, I also made an adjustment to try and move the soundstage back a bit. Plus we had shutters installed on the window behind. So all-in-all, probably enough changes to the room to affect the sound quite a lot.
I'll try and report back again next week. Whatever happens, someone's gotta come up with an aftermarket case for it if it's staying, or it's going to have to go in the floor behind something. Intona say its for industrial use and not audio (despite their website bizarrely being pretty much purely about audio from what I can gather), but even so - the case is too big for what's inside, and plain old fashioned and ugly.
Lack of listening time on the Intona wasn't helped by the fact that this weekend I discovered Somafm 'groove salad' station on internet radio, and found it hard to pull myself away from that streamed through the chromecast audio - it's like it was programmed just for me and it sounds pretty good despite the 64Aac stream. I've got a feeling that's going to bring me far more pleasure than a USB cable and box of tricks.
>>> 1st Place Award: Devialet, last decades most disappointing technology purchase. <<<
