This is my listening impression I mailed to Seth and he wanted me to post it here.
Hi Seth,
I have had the Virtue (the one with virtue caps and single input) for
the last 20 odd days. It has been broken in for about 60 hours.
For comparison I have had
Conrad Johnson MV 60 SE-- Virtue sounds much cleaner, nuances are
much better presented. The cj is much more tubey sounding but
definitely coloured. Much more so than I liked over long listening
sessions. The difference is more apparent in movie watching.
McIntosh MC275 -- they had a more heavy handed approach to music. The
nuances are even more subdued. The major sounds like treble, midrange
and bass are robustly presented but the intermixing small details are
subdued.
First Watt F5- Here the presentations were different but not better.
The bass was more pronounced in F5 but details are as prevalent as
Virtue audio. In movie watching this means more slam in explosions,
more rumble, more visceral impact.
I have returned Mcintosh and cj and am left with Virtue and F5. The
battery power supply is great and brings it on par with anything else
I have heard.
Is there any way I can bring the bass more slam.
My speakers are klipschorns. I really want to keep the virtue as they
have tremendous WAF (never underestimate it). It allows me to keep my
living room looking tidy.
Can you think of a way in which this can be achieved?
Can you break in the equipment before shipping it out?
Will the sound change much more (it has not changed much in the last
20 hours or so)?
Thanks for your help.
He replied back on Sunday within few hours. Great guy, great company policy.
They have a great product on their hands. I have also heard Marantz reference amplifier with their own pre amplifier with these klipschorns and they were good in their own way but more traditional sounding ( great sounding bass, mids but airiness was missing, more like Mcintosh MC 275).
I have not heard red wine audio or the other british integrated amps.
Still looking for the bass slam in these amps though.