Oxford Audio Consultants - Saturday 4th June

[thumb5]

A quick note to thank everyone at Oxford Audio Consultants for arranging this very enjoyable event.  Good to meet some of you from the forum there.  The dCS/800/Blade set-up sounded great to me, and I also heard some excellent new music.  Thank you!

[Zappydev]

A quick note to thank everyone at Oxford Audio Consultants for arranging this very enjoyable event.  Good to meet some of you from the forum there.  The dCS/800/Blade set-up sounded great to me, and I also heard some excellent new music.  Thank you!

Yep - fully echo those sentiments. Thanks to OAC for the very kind hospitality, and it was great to be able to put a few faces to names.

A lovely day indeed, and I agree re. the dCS/Blade system - awesome !

[GuillaumeB]

Likewise great to see a few here today. 

I spent most of my "listening" time in the dCS/800/Blades room. This room sounded very very good indeed. I noticed there was lots of other goodies: Stillpoints and Entreq and the new Chord Music speaker cables.

I was hugely impressed by the dCS Vivaldi Upsampler and Clock. Thanks to Liam of dCS we were treated to a wide range of up sampling and conversion combinations, so for example from redbook 44.1 to DSD, MP3 to DSD, 44.1 to 192 etc etc.

What was most impressive was when Frank streamed some lovely Barber/Joshua Bell from his iPhone to the Upsampler via Airplay. This was subsequently converted to DSD by the Upsampler. What a wonderful sound! (Thanks for the music tip Frank, just purchased and downloaded the album on Qobuz.   )

Tidal was also streamed with conversion to DSD and was most impressive.

In fact... I'd say this dCS up sampling technology is a game changer. Once Roon is fully integrated it will be a very exciting (and expensive) option.

Thanks to the OAC team for being such great hosts. And to Liam from dCS.

Guillaume

[Confused]

A superb day at Oxford Audio Consultants!  It was good to see Guillaume, NickB, Mrs NickB, Ian (Thumb5), Frank (F1eng) and others.  To be honest, I didn't catch everyone's name, there was a guy called Kevin, and some others, I see from the post above that Zappydev was there, I'm not sure if I met him or not!  Then there was the guy towards the end who was in the dCS/D800/Blades room who I think I could enlist as my personal DJ, he kept playing track after track that I liked (it doesn't matter how much kit you shove in the room, it's still all about music!), I think this was Kevin who I met earlier in the morning, however, I may be living up to my 'Confused' tag here.

Plus there was so much kit to play with and compare.   Almost too much to remember and post about, but here are some highlights....
Melco N1Z vs Melco N1ZH.  This was demoed using O’dA powered Wilson Audio Sash 2’s, so I think we can say a ‘competent’ system for such a test!  There have been some reports that these two sound more or less identical, with the N1ZH being £3.5 cheaper due to it not having the custom audio spec SSD drives.  This was a quick comparison but done blind, one track on player A, repeated on player B, and at the request of those listening, again on Player A.  OK, so hardly scientific an definitive, but I thought player B was slightly better in some aspects, Frank 'F1eng' (who does take a default questioning stance on all things audiophile) had the same view.  Funnily enough, Frank mentioned the sound quality of some bells being better on player B, and this is something that also struck me quite clearly.  Player B was the N1Z, isn't it annoying when the more expensive bit of kit that you have convinced yourself is not worth the extra cash ends up sounding just that little bit better?
OAC’s Dan also did a similar test of some stillpoints, one track with, the same track without.  Now this one was not performed blind (it is fairly obvious if they are in place or not).  OK, I have to say I am very cynical about these things, so I was not expecting to hear any difference, but you know what, I think it did sound better with the stillpoints in place, oh dear.....    I would like to spend more time trying such things to be sure, but that’s a way down the road for me.  My current hifi rack is probably about 16 or 17 years old now, from a time when I had less disposable income than now, it seems a bit silly shoving £100’s of pounds of isolators on a rack worth next to nothing.  Interesting though, worthy of future investigation.

We also had a USB cable back to back test, trying the Chord Sarum USB.  The Sarum is about £1000, and the cable it was compared with £400, so you could say this was a very good USB cable vs another very good USB cable.  This was only a quick one track test again, but it sounded pretty much identical with both cables to me.  (maybe because the £400 cable is a cracking ‘bargain’ buy???!!)

Another back to back test, the Aurender N10 feeding the O'dA via USB, then by AES.  This was particularly interesting for me.  There appeared to me to be more bass via USB, although I would say more, not better, but I think there was universal agreement amongst those in the room that AES sounded by far the best.  I recall listening to the W20 via AES vs the Melco N1Z via USB a few weeks back and I preferred the bass performance from the Aurender, with the Blades at least.  But what if you ran a Melco via a Mutec MC3+USB into the Devialet's AES input?  Well, that's for another day and off topic here, I must stop thinking about all this stuff!

NickB was being slightly mischievous as ever, but it was fascinating to listen to his Hifi Berry.  I am not sure of the spec of the thing, but apparently this is some kind of ultra high end tricked up Hifi Berry, costing a whopping £97.  So a £97 front end on O’dA powered Sasha 2’s??  Crazy maybe, but the little thing held it’s own, it sounded quite good.  I think someone wondering in the room, seeing a rack of various Melco’s & Aurenders could easily have been tricked into believing it was something else playing.  Was it as good as the N1ZH, or even AIR?  I don’t think it was, no, but it was a long way from disgracing itself, much better than you might expect.  It is also worth noting that the little hifi Berry was the only piece of hardware in the building capable of acting as a Roon endpoint, other than the slightly more expensive dSC rig.  I think for anyone thinking of setting up some kind of second room or multi room set up with Roon, one of these little things would be absolutely brilliant.

Then we have the dCS Vivaldi, which was demoed with a D800 and KEF Blades.  What can I say?  It is simply superb, mesmerisingly good.   It has made me think of a couple of my recent treads on this forum, ‘best possible sound quality from Roon’, and a similar thread for iTunes.  Well, I think I will need to update these threads, because unless anyone knows different the answer is the dSC Vivaldi Upsampler + Vivaldi Master Clock.  A splendid piece of kit, it ticks all the boxes with respect to functionality, run it from any music software you like, simply plug in a USB stick, it will play, you could run it from a digital output from your TV.  I think you could configure it to do more or less anything you had in mind.  Plus, as Guillaume mentioned, it has Airplay.  However, it’s trump card is sound quality, it sounded good with whatever it was fed, very good indeed!  So is this the killer product we all need to rush out and buy?  Well, the list price is over £24,000 for the Upsampler and Master Clock.  I think it would be easy to dismiss it at this price, considering £24k a ridiculous sum of money, but you know what, it is arguably worth it.  You then need to consider if you have a ‘spare’ £24k and what else you could do with this kind of money.  

Guillaume’s earlier post used the term ‘game changer’ with respect to the dCS upsampling technology.  An interesting term I thought.  The thing is, I have been listening to various Aurenders, Melcos, the Cad Cat etc, and they all manage to do good things, and put a little distance between themselves and AIR sound quality.  But the thing is, I think the dCS is a level up from the lot of them.  This is why I find Guillaume’s term ‘game changer’ interesting, I was of the view that something like an Aurender N10 / W20 was maybe close to state of the art, the limits of what is possible, but no, there is a level up.  So how will all this digital stuff develop over the next few years?  Will we see all in one ‘Rooned’ music servers (assuming Roon survives a few years?) with similar technology and performace to the dCS, but at Melco / Aurender price levels?  Or will this kind of performance remain at the ‘reassuringly expensive’ end of the market for some time to come.  Fascinating stuff!  I think if I was in the hifi business, either someone like Sonore or even the one of the mass producers like Pioneer, I would be reverse engineering and analysing the dSC kit to work out how they do it.  The trouble is, similar dCS kit has been around for a while, and nobody has done it yet, so I think in the medium term, if you want this kind of performance, you will need to stump up the money!  Oh, but I do so hope I am wrong with this one....

Anyway, a big thanks to Jon, Alasdair & Dan at OAC for organising what has to be one of the best events of this type, (as well as providing coffee, chocolate nibbles, etc.) and many thanks to Liam from dCS for bringing his toys along – epic!.  Superb stuff!

And then to the highlight of my year......   No, not hearing the dCS rig, but Guillaume turning up and giving me a ‘Devialet Chat’ polo shirt.  I shall treasure it always.  (or at least until it wears out a bit and goes a little misshapen)

[Soniclife]

Great day out at the toy shop yesterday, lots of stuff to play with, and interesting conversations.

I’ve largely ignored the digital front end into the amp up till now, I’d been focused on finding speakers I loved for years, and replacing a pile of Naim with a 200 a few years ago was an unplanned and unexpected detour.  And because it sounded amazing via USB from the silent PC I already had, and being in the bit’s are bit’s camp (as long as the DAC controls the clock) I was happy to leave it for the future whilst I continued speaker hunting.  A few months ago I finally bought new (to me) speakers so paying attention to the digital front end is drifting up my priority order, so this day was good timing.

I missed some of the earlier dems with the Melcos and the stillpoints, but was there for a some of the later tests.  For all these tests it should be noted this wasn’t exactly perfect dems conditions, people were coming and going, unfamiliar systems relaxed atmosphere etc, so I totally reserve my right to change my mind in the future.

Using the Aurender X100 (I think) the ‘cheap’ chord usb cable was compared to the spendy chord usb cable.  I didn’t hear any difference.

Then the Aurender X100 was compared to the N10, with the expensive chord usb cable, again I didn’t hear any difference.  Though there was a detour into “that’s not the same version of the track” here  I think.

Then the N10 was swapped to feed the O’da via AES (using super expensive chord cable).  This was interesting, there was a difference, the bass seemed ‘thumpier’ via usb, and the vocals had more presence via AES.  I preferred the AES, on this track on this system, so this is definitely worthy of future investigation for me.

It wasn’t done back to back with anything but AIR3 was put on from a mac mini a bit later, and I was intrigued to think that this might be better than the other toys used before, this really did seem a tiny bit better, it had a complexity, richness and ease that seemed great to me.

At some point later Alasdair re-did the stillpoint under the N10 dem.  I’m very much a non-believer in supports under components, excepting turntables, speakers and some CD players, and I’m afraid my mind wandered of and just started listening to the Radiohead track used during the dem, so I didn’t hear a difference.  

The DCS, 800s and blades sounded room sounded really great.  I’ve spend a fair bit of time in this room before, but have never heard any of these components before so am unable to comment on the DCS, other than to say that even with only 11/12ths of a pair of blades the sound was amazing.  So I just sat there playing tracks I like, they all sounded great, and some of there recorded for less than the price of the digital cable used!

My conclusion is I need to wait for Air3, if the SQ holds up, and the reliability is there this may be all I need.  And failing that it will give a real baseline for others to better.

I still largely believe that bits are bits, but the interface does seem to matter, and the DCS may have even better bits, if you can afford them.

Kevin.

[Soniclife]

Then there was the guy towards the end who was in the dCS/D800/Blades room who I think I could enlist as my personal DJ, he kept playing track after track that I liked (it doesn't matter how much kit you shove in the room, it's still all about music!), I think this was Kevin who I met earlier in the morning, however, I may be living up to my 'Confused' tag here.

I think that was me, I was playing tracks by EMA, Grimes, The Verve, Pixes, Sharon Van Etten, Paul Simon, The Elephant Sessions & The Staves, and typing that in I've just realised why I got home later than I expected to.

Kevin.

[Womaz]

A fantastic thread guys, thoroughly enjoyable, sounds like a great day

[Confused]

A fantastic thread guys, thoroughly enjoyable, sounds like a great day

You need to move down to the Midlands Womaz, better hifi dealers, not to mention football teams.  

[Womaz]

A fantastic thread guys, thoroughly enjoyable, sounds like a great day

You need to move down to the Midlands Womaz, better hifi dealers, not to mention football teams.  

Massive huff :-) ;-) probably right on both accounts too

[octaviars]

Some pictures would be nice