A tale of gear swapping

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jMelvin

A tale of gear swapping
« on: 20 Oct 2020, 12:47 pm »
With too much time on my hands as of late I’ve been revisiting some gear I have in storage. The Schiit Eitr is the latest to be resurrected. I had a good experience with it feeding my MHDT Lab Pagoda but removed it for ultimate simplicity, feeding the DAC via USB directly from a Sonore microRendu. What’s a wee bit more complexity if it elevates the sound quality? So, the system now looks like this:

mRendu→Eitr→Pagoda→SE84UFO→Super 3i’s & DeepHemp 8

I’m using an old Black Cat Silverstar! 75 cable to connect the two. (I prefer the BNC input on this DAC so an adapter is needed on the Eitr end.) I played a variety of music for a couple of hours before putting on Brad Mehldau Trio’s “Blues and Ballads” (24/88.2), which is wonderfully dynamic and well-recorded.

Sounds good, at least equal to my previous direct connection to the mRendu. However, there was something ever-so-slightly off I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I listened to the entire album, which is my favorite Mehldau and one I’m quite familiar with. Perhaps the addition of the Eitr, the added complexity, is detrimental after all?

Then it dawned on me .. I forgot to turn on the subwoofer! I had a good laugh, promptly turned it back on, and laughed some more. Now we’re cooking. Sounds fantastic. The Eitr will remain, at least for now.

The point of this story .. I’m amazed all over again with my Super 3i’s (sans subwoofer). The bass, while not exactly deep, is quite satisfying. Not DeepHemp 8 satisfying, but quite good nonetheless. I don’t know how Louis does what he does with this 4.5" driver in a small box, but I’m sure glad I took a chance on his speakers.