Thumb5's system - Printable Version +- Devialet Chat (https://devialetchat.com) +-- Forum: Devialet Chat (https://devialetchat.com/Forum-Devialet-Chat) +--- Forum: Your Systems (https://devialetchat.com/Forum-Your-Systems) +--- Thread: Thumb5's system (/Thread-Thumb5-s-system) |
RE: Thumb5's system - thumb5 - 03-Mar-2016 Thanks ML! Reviews are a bit thin on the ground -- I found three or four on-line -- but do seem to be very enthusiastic. Not sure how much can be judged from that but it did encourage me to put the Chiaras onto my short list. Luckily the dealer in the UK (I think there is only one, but may be wrong) is not too far away from me. If you do get a chance to hear the Chiaras or any of the Kaiser floor-standers then I'd recommend doing so. By the way, having owned Sonus fabers for longer than I can remember, including a pair of Minimas before the Guarneris, it's nice to retain a small connection with Italy, even if it's only in the name! RE: Thumb5's system - MusicLover - 05-Mar-2016 (03-Mar-2016, 19:11)thumb5 Wrote: Thanks ML! Reviews are a bit thin on the ground -- I found three or four on-line -- but do seem to be very enthusiastic. Not sure how much can be judged from that but it did encourage me to put the Chiaras onto my short list. I will try to listen to any Kaiser speaker as soon as I get the chance! I'm quite intrigued, I must say. Coming from a strong SF background like yours, keeping your next speaker's name within Italian reach is the least you could do! Please, keep us posted with your impressions as your Chiaras start singing! RE: Thumb5's system - thumb5 - 26-Oct-2016 It's a while since I've posted anything here, mainly because nothing has changed. I've been really enjoying the Chiaras, which work brilliantly over a wide range of music (and volume levels!). Today's post is because I've got a 440 Pro to listen to for a couple of days to help me make my mind up about whether to upgrade from the 400. Very exciting! I've only had an hour or so of proper listening, but so far I'm definitely impressed. After a bit more listening -- probably tomorrow or Friday -- I'll add some notes with subjective impressions about what I'm hearing. Watch this space... RE: Thumb5's system - thumb5 - 29-Oct-2016 The 440 Pro has gone back now, so it's time to reflect a bit on how it sounded. To cut it short: it sounded wonderful, and I'll be upgrading (actually using OAC's new-for-old exchange scheme). First impressions were of a (much!) bigger sound stage and more bass depth. At a given volume level it sounds "bigger" than a 400. Mids and trebles have the same character as the 400 -- precise and detailed but without being the slightest bit fatiguing. I could convince myself that there's a smidge more "air" and space on the 440 Pro, but I wouldn't swear to it (and in any case that might be due to firmware differences - I'm still using 7.1.3 on the 400). But to put the differences into a single sentence, the thing I kept coming back to is that the 440 Pro sounds more eager to get involved with the music: by comparison the 400 sounds just that little bit detached. I've never found the 400 wanting and wasn't expecting to hear such a significant change. It really surprises me that Devialet have managed to wring so more performance out of the 440 Pro with what -- on paper, at least -- seem to be minor tweaks. It's more of everything I like about the 400. One other bonus is that both master and companion were completely silent: no trace of any power supply fizzing. Let's hope that's due to the revised design and not just a happy fluke. The only very minor negative I could put my finger on was that the push button on the front of the amps isn't quite as elegant as the original design. RE: Thumb5's system - Axel - 29-Oct-2016 (29-Oct-2016, 09:52)thumb5 Wrote: The 440 Pro has gone back now, so it's time to reflect a bit on how it sounded.Totally agree about the power button. The original was a nice enamel looking object. The new one is very plain silver. Still, If that's all we've got to moan about that's good! RE: Thumb5's system - thumb5 - 11-Nov-2016 The new 440 Pro is scheduled to arrive today...fingers crossed! RE: Thumb5's system - thumb5 - 11-Nov-2016 It's here (and my old 400 has gone)! After a few hours sitting around powered off, waiting for it to acclimatise to room temperature, it's just playing its first music (Riverside's "Where the River Flows" from "Eye of the Soundscape", as it happens) at a tick-over volume. Sounding jolly good right out of the box and at low volume -- really, really nice. More to come once I've given it a proper listen. Incidentally both master and companion have firmware 10.0.6 installed. RE: Thumb5's system - Hifi_swlon - 11-Nov-2016 Yes! My 250 was freezing out of the box, and I probably gave it slightly less time than I should have - but anyway it sounded horrible that first night. You're in for a bit of a treat this week RE: Thumb5's system - thumb5 - 28-Jan-2017 Some changes afoot as I'm adding a dedicated Mac Mini to stream music from instead of my MacBook Pro. The main aims here are:
My music library is stored on an Apple Time Capsule (NAS) which is the main wireless access point, extended by the Airport Express. I already have the top part set up: in particular, the 440 Pro has a wired Ethernet connection to the Airport Express via the integrated switch in the ZP90. This seems to be working reliably both with respect to AIR via Ethernet and operation of the Sonos mesh network, including streaming music from my library to the ZP90. The ZP90 has its wireless interface permanently disabled because it doesn't play nicely with the Airport Express (for reasons unknown). The new part is adding the Mac Mini with a USB interface to the Devialet, of course. This configuration gives me plenty of flexibility:
The Mac Mini will be backed up to Amazon S3/Glacier using Haystack Software's Arq. That configuration has several advantages:
Not shown on that diagram is that the power to the 440 Pro is from a Vertex AQ Taga, whereas all the rest of the gear is run straight from the mains socket. There may be some opportunities to improve sound quality (TBD) by keeping all the interfaces to the 440 Pro isolated from the sources. For example:
The obvious choices include:
Roon is next on the list to try, but I'm holding out until 1.3 is released before starting a trial. Hopefully not long now... RE: Thumb5's system - baddog - 28-Jan-2017 Well that setup will give you quite a number of options. If you do decide to try out Roon 1.3 when it is released shortly, it should work well with either your locally attached music or those on the network. Out of curiosity, or perhaps I missed it, why is the Sonos feeding the D440 Pro as well? |