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Review in Positive Feedback on D-Premier Upgrade
#1
Always surprising to see reviews such as this one pop up.  The reviewer concludes: "With Expert 250 Pro, the musical presentation was taken to another level. What I heard now was not only singularly more resolved, there was also an atmosphere of delicacy that culminated in a new level of musical refinement. The music appeared weightless. It just hovered there, appearing to float suspended in space."  In short, the upgrade was recommended.
Devialet Expert 220 Pro Kinki EX-M7 power amp tethered to a fiber-fed Lumin X1 streamer via Grimm XLRs, Vivid B1 Decade speakers in Rosso Barchetta red (only 200 produced in a limited edition), Roon Nucleus with a Samsung 860 EVO 2TB SSD, etherREGEN switch fed by a Sonore opticalModule (and Sonore-supplied transceivers and 1M optical cable) with a SOtM dCBL-Cat7 cable to my Nucleus and a DH Labs Reunion Cat8 to my Lumin T2 streamer, Keces P8 linear power supply feeding a (to come) NUC and EtherREGEN switch with an external AfterDark OCXO clock., and opticalModule (5V/1A), AudioQuest Niagara 1000 power conditioner, ASI LiveLine loom (purchased directly from Franck Tchang when I lived in France), Less Loss Firewall for Speakers and Roon lifetime license with Tidal streaming.
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#2
Interesting review. Certainly nice that it is so positive but also quite neat that it really focuses on the differences after the upgrade. I like also that it is quite a 'personal experience and impressions' approach as well as having good descriptions of the sound. I'm not aware of any other pre vs post upgrade comparison done with both amps in hand.

Thanks for linking this review
Damon
Powernode, NAD M32, Cambridge CD transport, Analysis Plus, Nordost, iFi Nova, CSS Criton 1TDX, KEF C62
Vancouver, Canada
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#3
A reviewer who has had a D-Premier for about ten years and "By-passed the internal DAC". Makes me wonder.
                                                    Lifetime Roon, Mac mini, int. SSD, ext. HDD, tv as monitor, key board and track pad on bean bag as remote,Devialet 200, Od'A #097, Blue jeans speaker cable,                                     
                                                                                                                                                                            Dynaudio C1 MkII.
                                                                                                                                                                              Jim Smith's GBS.
                                                                                                                                                                        Northern NSW Australia.
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#4
(12-Dec-2020, 19:35)Damon Wrote: Interesting review. Certainly nice that it is so positive but also quite neat that it really focuses on the differences after the upgrade. I like also that it is quite a 'personal experience and impressions' approach  as well as having good descriptions of the sound. I'm not aware of any other pre vs post upgrade comparison done with both amps in hand.

Thanks for linking this review

Damon - your comment above made me think back to the time I listened to a D800 versus a D1000 at Oxford Audio, shortly after the 1000 Pro was released.  This got me interested in exactly what I said at the time, with a bit of searching I found the post:

Expert 1000 Pro (devialetchat.com)

Very different words and language used between myself and the positive feedback review, which I guess is normal between people describing subjective listening experiences, but I think the overall sentiment and conclusion is similar.

You make a good point though, I have read some reviews of the Pro where the reviewer is comparing to a distant memory of a previous D-Premier or Expert that they have reviewed, and I think that the said review then completely fails to pick up just how different the amps sound in some respects.  So a direct comparison like this is more interesting and informative.

@Pim - I read the review last night and the "bypass the the internal DAC" bit caught my attention too.  I suppose that this does indicate a lack of understanding regarding the internal architecture of the Devialet, but I find it easy to believe that the reviewer may have subjectively preferred the sound with the Mytek Brooklyn Bridge.  Dare I say it, there might be a touch of expectation bias here?  It happens to the best of us.  The Mytek hails from the world of Pro audio and has a reputation for being very accurate, transparent and detailed.  Maybe it was not actually changing the sound that much, but was making the listener feel a bit better about things.  For sure it could not have been helping much.  One thing we know about the D-Premier is that it measures better via it's digital inputs versus the analogue, how audible this might be is debatable, but "going direct" via digital has to be the way to go.

So here we establish that the reviewer and myself reached fairly similar conclusions, but the reviewer clearly does not know what he is doing and is riddled with expectation bias.  It is a perilous game this subjective reviewing business.   Confused
1000 Pro - KEF Blade - iFi Zen Stream - Mutec REF10 - MC3+USB - Pro-Ject Signature 12
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#5
I've had an email exchange with mr. Balgalvis re: "bypass the the internal DAC". This has cleared the misunderstanding and mr. Balgalvis has asked his editor to remove the section discussing this from the review.
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250 Pro CI, MicroRendu(1.4), Mutec MC-3+USB
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