[azryan]

Got my XR45 HT mod back on Fri.

I had been running my XR25 for the month my 45 was gone and had been using the stock 45 for about a month before I shipped it off to get modded.

First the looks of the modded back...

The 3 sets of tiny binding posts for Cent and Rear L/R are VERY close together and the last set (the Left Rear) is part on the Pannie’s case and part on the new metal plate Wayne had made for this mod -which means that it angles a little towards the Right Rear posts that are already super close to each other.

When I put my banana plugs into both  rear channels the plugs totally touch each other.

I had to floss a piece of plastic between the two sets. I wasn’t thinking that was too cool, but hopefully won’t be any actual problem which is what matters in the end.

I suspect I’ll have to do the same flossed plastic spacer again when I plug in my center chan too (which I should be getting fairly soon I hope).

I know Wayne has said it’ll take about a month to break in so maybe this isn’t fair to speak of the sound before that, but I think it’s fair enough afterexplaining that this 45's modded parts are only a few days run in.

I do plan on writing a follow up in about a month or so too.

Anyway.... right off the bat it was just good to have the 45 back in rather than the 25 I’ve been using for the last month.

The 45's volume control is dead silent, but the 25 makes a tiny ‘tick’with each db step. That’s enough to show the two are not identical and which is suckier. heh

Also the 25 gets REAL HOT when not playing loudly which means the fan never comes on.
The heat I think is from the power supply ‘cuz it’s that back left corner where that heat comes from (where the PS is) and not in a line down the center of the Rec. which is where the row of powerDACs actually are.
I dunno though?

The 45 seemed to be much better at not getting nearly as hot and the fan works better to keep things cool and then shutting off fast when things are quiet.

I still don’t have any idea how Wayne and the other guys who’ve tried out Wayne’s Pannie find that the fan never comes on??

My speakers are more effi. than any they’ve used and I know I listen at a vol. setting no higher than they’ve ever tested it.

I almost never go past -15db (typically like -30 to -25 for most music and -15 for DVD’s) and the fan comes on here and there during the louder sections where it must be able to tell there’s more current running? It doesn’t work based on sensing heat. That much is clear.


99% of the time I  never hear the fan, but sometimes something loud gets quiet fast (like the end of a loud song that doesn’t fade out) and you catch the fan stopping a second later.

It’s a very faint sound so no big deal really. I thought maybe something about Wayne’s mod might lessen the fan coming on since people said they 'never' had the fan come on, but it seems the just the same in my system as when the 45 was stock.
Oh well.

Overall when I sent the 45 off to Wayne and put the 25 in I could tell the 25 was very similar but still seemed a bit grainier and more processed sounding.
Over the month or so the 45 was gone I just listened to less and less music which for me seems to be a good gauge of how good I actually think my audio system is. The urge to listen to music for hours on end.

Just like a step down in refinement and realism from the 45 (which wasn’t tops in either of those anyway), so putting the newly modded 45 back in made an even clearer difference between the two, and I am finding myself listening to more music as a result.

You still have to really care about audio to hear the diff.

My wife wasn’t really hearing much diff., but then she didn’t really tell the 25 was any worse than the stock 45 either.
She’s not an 'audiophile', but she has heard the 'clear' changes in lots of stuff I’ve had in here over the years.

Like the day we got our eARTwo amp. It was VERY costly and I told her I'd send it back if she couldn't tell any diff. or not enough of one, but on day one it was so clearly better than the Tripath based digital amp we had that she was fine with us keeping it.

Anyway...  if you really do care about listening to music and know what to listen for THEN I think you can tell the bass seems stronger/tighter and the highs are smoother and have lost that little edge of grain/harshness inherent in the 45 and even more-so in the 25.

Again...  this is only the first few days and I’ve been told it takes a month to break in and it’s a ‘dramatic’ change. I plan to follow up on that later.

At least for now it doesn’t have that totally liquid real sound from things like cymbals that I just loved about the eARTwo ICEpower digital amp we owned, but I'd say it’s about halfway between that and the stock 25.

Where it’s at I would call VERY good, but still not world class.

'IF' it doesn’t get much better over time I think I’ll still be happy enough with it. I was almost 'happy enough’ with the stock 45 and it seems like this mod has at the very least taken care of the only real  ‘issues’ I had with the 45 -which was it’s top that just wasn’t right.

'IF' it gets 'dramatically' better after a month or so of break in then I’ll be thrilled with it and 100% glad I got the mod.

As of now I'm still not sure of it's full worth.

I wanted the little top end problem fixed, but I also wanted a BIG improvement overall to really call this thing world class and worth the cost of the mod.

It's hardto go wrong though since the total cost is SO much less than even just the eARTwo amp I had.... but that amp sounded better so we'll see what happens.

I went with the Bybee filter option on the Main L/R and Cent. chan. too BTW.

So as of now it is smoother overall (which is pretty smooth in world class terms IMO), slightly stronger bass (which was already very strong and had little issue with anyway).
I don't notice much diff. on the midrange but the stock 45 was very clean and detailed in the first place.

I have heard better in my system in terms of truly realistic liquid sounding cymbals and upper end detail like that and overall the soundstage doesn’t seem any diff. from the stock 45.

Obviously this isn’t exactly a rave, but it does sound better than stock 45 and more so the 25 and I do intend to post again when I really break it in.
I just thought I should post a little about what it started out as and do it while my memory was still fresh rather than try to describe what it was like a month or so from now.

[azryan]

126 hits and no replies huh? hmm, ok.

Anyway... just a brief follow up...

Listening to music last night for several hours and my wife said that she really can hear that it's sounding better than the stock 25 that's been there the past month.

For me -Warning major audio cliche'- I was really hearing datails I hadn't ever heard before and things were sounding just reallllly transparent. Just such incredibly microscopic specks of this or that recording were coming through so clearly.

I think the main thing I'll be looking for is to see what happens with the highs.
It's still not as realistic as the eARTwo but listening to some Patricia Barber with some really clear percussion and cymbal work... it was pretty dang close to what the eAR did.

I can't say that this is due to it breaking in a bit more or due to my just getting used to what it does on more and more CD's or what the reason is.

That not ever being 100% sure is the bane of an audiophile I think.

Anyway... I'm very happy with it in most ways and I'll follow up after the full rec. break in time.

[Tyson]

OK, I'll reply

My thoughts pretty much mirror yours.  But I've moved my unit from the main 2 channel rig to the HT, because I'm still breaking it in.  After it's been in the HT for a while I'll move it back to the 2 channel setup to evaluate further.  If I were to do a quick report of the sound right now, I'd say it has loads of detail, extremely transparent, very good bass, and is very impressive sounding, especially for it's price point.  I would say it was on par with my AVA gear in just about every area except one, musicality.  I still find the AVA stuff has more of the "breath of life" type sound I like, probably because it's a tube hybrid.  But the breakin for the 45 is still not done yet, so I'll post more at length once I've got a couple hundred more hours on it.

[wshuff]

OK, I'll bite.

I've not really kept up with the Pannie threads since I'm not really in the market for electronics, but I have noticed that some people are running the Pannie in some sort of party mode.

How are you using it?  Party mode/bi-amp/whatever, or just using two channels to power the Alphas?

[JoshK]

The only problem I see with all of this is you can no longer find the 45s, so anyone reading your comments and gets excited about this cannot follow suit unless they already have a 45 sitting around.  

This has got to limit the number of mod requests that Wayne's been receiving.  I hope the 70 is up to par of the 45 for the potential customers and for Wayne's biz.

[mcrespo71]

Ryan,

I read it and thought it was an interesting read, but I was really interested in hearing more impressions after the break in.  I'm always amazed how much things change during break in, so I was just waiting on the sidelines till the "true sound" broke through, if you will.

Michael

[zybar]

A slightly different note, I put in a stock X45 into my secondary system.  This unit repalced my Denon AVR-4800 receiver.  Outside of lacking some features and functionality, it is doing suprisingly well.

My unit is fully broken in (Sunshinedawg used it while Wayne worked on his unit).  While I wouldn't even remotely consider it for my main system in stock form, I can see why many people are enjoying it.

Now as for Ryan's observations...I am more interested in how it sounds after break in.  From talking with Sunshinedawg (aka Sean), I knew that it will need quite a few hours to get significantly better.  PLease post after that happens.

George

[azryan]

Thanks for the posts. I didn't want to feel like I was talkin' to myself. heh
Those kind 'a people are nuts. Crap, I just said that out loud !@#$!@#


Yeah I guess it is somewhat pointless since the 45 is no longer avail.

I figure this is more-so about the result of 'somthing' getting modded since most mods seem to encompass the kind of stuff that was done here (new caps, better wire/connectors, etc).
Plus the effect of first impressions and future break in results/perception in general.

Also talking about just how far this little all digital critter can go. No doubt some kind of future sumthin' will take this approach if not a lot more stuff.

Tyson,

So are you keeping your AVA gear still then? Still up in the air? Also...

"-I would say it was on par with my AVA gear in just about every area except one, musicality.-"

Is this just vs. your Pannie which you're still breaking in OR also vs. the fully broken in one Wayne brought over those couple of times for you guys to A/B?

You have that broken in point of ref. that I don't and didn't know how you meant what you said vs. your AVA gear.


wshuff,

I'm not using it in 'party' mode -though I could if I just unplugged the surround speakers and plugged in the woofer section into the surround outputs.

It seemed to me that-

1). ~-25db on the vol. for most music is f'in' LOUD with the Alphas and -20 equals one Watt. 'Does this little thing have enough power' just isn't an issue at all here.
I tried 'party' bi-amping when the Pannie was stock and it didn't seem to do much diff.

2). I had those magical mysterious Bybee filters put on the main channels (and center) so using the single output the whole speaker gets a Bybee filtered signal. That seems like a better way to go over just the planar tweeter section getting Bybee'd.

3). I seemed that in 'party' mode the overall output was about 6db lower than normal stereo so you double your power from bi-amping -gaining about 3db, but lose about 6db.

That didn't seem like the right way to go, but I'll never need to turn the vol. up to -6db muchless the max at -0 so I guess 'real world' it doesn't really matter.

JoshK,

I think Wayne already said the XR50 has some 'relay' deal that makes it worse sounding? I forget what he said exactly though, but it seemed like the XR70 would have that same design.

Why couldn't a company like Pannie hire someone like Wayne to create a mod-type reworking of a system like this and then have Pannie buy all these parts in bulk and have machines (or Malaysians?) put it together and pop it in a nicer case.

Everyone could buy one and jeez, how much cheaper would it cost to just have it made this way in the first place?

[mcrespo71]

Ryan,

Yeah, modding is an interesting cottage industry of the high end.  I don't think it is always the answer to a problem one may have with a piece of equipment.  I can think of some integrated amps created by Rega that initially in prototype form used better parts, but actually sounded better using less top shelf resistors, capacitors, etc, so they released the version with the "lesser" parts that sounded better.  I don't think that just replacing something with better parts guarantees better sound.  The only mods I have ever had done were done by a member of Conrad Johnson's design team that quit and started offering mods to different pieces of their equipment.  Given that he had an intimate relationship with the designs of several of CJ's preamps/amps, he knew where costs had been cut to make a certain design hit a price point.  For example, my CJ PV12A listed for $2500, but made certain allowances in parts to allow them to create a full function preamp at that price.  The former CJ designer replaced all of the stuff that needed to be replaced to make the design more competitive- coupling caps, internal wiring, rear RCA jacks, etc.- though there were certain things he would not touch, as it would interfere with how the designers voiced the CJ sound.  Anyway, when I first got the pre back, it was detailed and dynamic as hell, but also brutally strident.  It took a good 100 hours till it sounded good.

On the other hand, I've heard modded Rega turntables that completely ruin the house sound of Rega, effectively turning the tables into pale VPI imitations.  Hey, if you want a VPI, don't stick acrylic on your Rega, go buy a VPI.

Michael

[Red Dragon Audio]

Got my XR45 HT mod back on Fri.

I had been running my XR25 for the month my 45 was gone and had been using the stock 45 for about a month before I shipped it off to get modded.

First the looks of the modded back...

The 3 sets of tiny binding posts for Cent and Rear L/R are VERY close together and the last set (the Left Rear) is part on the Pannie’s case and part on the new metal plate Wayne had made for this mod -which means that it angles a little towards the Right Rear posts that are already supe ...

I just wanted to add a little comment here about a product I tried out to see if it would smooth out my Panny SA XR25 (yeah I couldn't track down a 45 in time and the 25 is pretty darn good for the $200 I paid).

Just a note: I am in no way affilliated with this company (I am a jeweler by trade) but I think it did a nice job on my 25.  It is the Dakiom feedback stabalizer.  I don't even know if the 25 uses any feedback at all but this device smoothed out that grainy digital top-end you and I both are hearing from these units.  I still hear traces of it now and then on certain strings but overall it has smoothed out considerably.

I do feel a bit more sense of air now in my music and it is more relaxing to listen to for extended periods of time.

Sadly from the very first day I brought the 25 home it has had an ongoing problem with any surround mode.  So I had to send it back and it has been gone for about 1.5 weeks...so sad.  The Dakiom unit had nothing to do with this as I have had the 25 since January and I have only had the Dakiom for a month.  After it comes back I will listen for two weeks with the Dakiom in the chain and then pull it out to compare the difference and try to make sure I'm not just hearing things.  I did get it for $79 so it wasn't as costly a tweak as three bybees (one for the digital input and one for each speaker).  However if this little baby does have a positive impact on the sound (which I hope isn't some psychosematic dilly) I will keep it in the mix and start experiementing with bybees next...

Wait scratch that order of operations: First a better powercord then onto swapping out the main binding posts (don't need biamping or killer surround posts)...then I will try one bybee on the digital input...listen for a couple of weeks and then put one on each speaker.

Maybe I can track down a used 45 around some where but I haven't seen one yet on Audiogon or Ebay.  Then I could compare a semi modded 25 to a stock 45...then it would be time to ship the 45 off to wayne.

ok I am done.

[azryan]

I don't think the Pannie has any feedback so not sure what that feedback stabalizer is doing? Interesting though.


Last night I was really feeling like this thing is sounding as good as the eARTwo does on the top end in the form of smoothness clarity.
I'm really getting to like this more and more.

It's as if your system changed it's volume by ~1/4db each day. You don't just flat out notice it but after a few days and then a few more days you're saying to yourself... 'Man, I KNOW this thing was not this loud before!'

Now relpace 'loud' with 'clear, deep/strong, and smoooooth'.

Still letting it do what it's gonna do over time, but I think it's looking like it's going to be doing what I'd like it to do.

I'd be willing to put it up against high end stuff now even if it's still not broken in. It might not 'beat' everything, but it won't look like a loser vs. anything IMO.

I'll be able to live with this I think.

It's a weird thing how the mod is WAAAAAY more than the cost of the actual Rec. and the Rec. itself gets you most of the way, but it NEEDED modding and compared to REALLLY costly gear I think it's coming out great.

It's maybe like finding a great sports car used for dirt cheap. It runs and it really such an amazing deal, but it obviously needs some work and looks beat up a bit....
So you take it to a pro racing crew and they charge you way more than the car cost but it comes out looking and performing like a high class new race car.
And one you couldn't buy for near the total price elsewhere.

Kind of a rip off and kind of a stellar deal at the same time. Very weird, but I'm thinking more about the stellar deal part than the former now.

Note- I KNOW Wayne is charging a VERY VERY fair price for the work and parts that go into the mod. i'm not saying anything he's doing is a rip-off.
It's NOT at ALL.

I was just relating the price of the mod vs. the price of the thing being modded.
Like I said... VERY odd how all this works out.

Too bad something like this can't just be mass produced in the first place and Pannie or another Mega-company pays Wayne to fix all the stock system's short cuts that degraded the quality hidden inside it.

No one EVER said hi-end audio made sense though. hehe

[azryan]

Oh yeah... little non-audio 'tweak' I think works great...

I put two strips Aqua and two Purple of cellophane over the display which makes it a deep dark blue instead of the much brighter/almost white aqua (typical display color). MUCH cooler looking IMO.

You could probably just use dark blue cellophane but I didn't have any.

I covered the little red power and DSP indicator lights with a strip of clear tape and then electrical tape over that (‘cuz elec. tape is so gummy you don’t want that directly on the Pannie) so that's pure black at all times.

Really makes this thing near invisible on black MDF base on my floor between two veneered and MDF capped cement fence blocks which will hold up the center speaker that I don't have yet.

-babbling over-

[Red Dragon Audio]

Oh yeah... little non-audio 'tweak' I think works great...

I put two strips Aqua and two Purple of cellophane over the display which makes it a deep dark blue instead of the much brighter/almost white aqua (typical display color). MUCH cooler looking IMO.

You could probably just use dark blue cellophane but I didn't have any.

I covered the little red power and DSP indicator lights with a strip of clear tape and then electrical tape over that (‘cuz elec. tape is so gummy you don’t want that directl ...

Did you do this over the long light strip too?  Why did you cover up the power and DSP lights?  Just so it is invisible/stealth?

[azryan]

"-Did you do this over the long light strip too?-"

No. That goofy thing stays 'off' at all times. Just hit the 'dimmer' button on the remote to kill it.

That thing's gotta be the dumbest light I've ever seen in any audio gear ever made.

"-Why did you cover up the power and DSP lights? Just so it is invisible/stealth?-"

I hate little lights like that. As long as the display can't be turned off no need to have another red light to tell me the unit it on.
No need to see if the DD or DTS light is on since that's all automaticly switched depending on what signal you send into it.

I do stuff like that on everything.
On my RPTV's bright green power light I made a tiny frame of elec. tape over clear tape to make the light a tiny speck that doesn't 'glow' if that makes sense?

So I can still see the light but can totally ignore it when watching the screen.

[Jay S]

Wow, glad to hear that the modded XR45 is starting to match the eAR Two!      My plan is to replace my Joule tube pre and eAR Two within the next two years with a modded digital receiver.  I got excited when I came across the Pioneer EX-500 a month ago since it seemed to have similar specs as the XR45 + it has built in digital room correction (it even includes a mic).  But I wasn't able to find any info or reviews of it, so I decided not to take the risk.  Keep us posted on your impressions of the modded XR45!

[azryan]

Are you saying this Pio uses digital amps of some kind or that it specifically uses the Tex.In. Equibit chips in the Pannie XR's?

I still think if Sony get's their act together and gets some good S-Master recs out that these will kick butt too.

The 2000ES sounded real good but had a HIGH noise floor (where the Pannie has none at all) and was spiking my ears really bad but randomly. It was weird. Other than that it was a little better than the XR25.

The stock XR45 is better than the XR25 though and the Sony was $800. Even getting it for about half price I still returned it and got the XR45 to be modded.

They pulled the 3000ES and 5000ES but not sure about the 2000ES I returned. Anyway.... I'd wait till Sony cleans all that up, but I could see them as being a good option to mod down the road maybe.

[Red Dragon Audio]

Wow, glad to hear that the modded XR45 is starting to match the eAR Two!      My plan is to replace my Joule tube pre and eAR Two within the next two years with a modded digital receiver.  I got excited when I came across the Pioneer EX-500 a month ago since it seemed to have similar specs as the XR45 + it has built in digital room correction (it even includes a mic).  But I wasn't able to find any info or reviews of it, so I decided not to take the risk.  Keep us posted on your impressions of the modded XR45!

Here is the Pioneer EX-500 package for $398http://www.hookedontronics.com/show_product_details.jsp?cid=5614&c=0405Froogle&b=Pioneer+Elite_EX-500">click here

This could be a very cool option for those of us who missed the 45.  Anyone want to take the modding plunge?  If and when I get the spare cash I just might depending on whether or not it is readily available.  I don't want to go getting people all excited over another model that is going to be discontinued before it gets out.

[azryan]

It looks like a mass market HT in a Box type package to me.

I think it might just use a switching power supply to make it so small? Are people sure it uses digital amps?
Pio's site didn't seem to say anything.
Easy for them to say 'digital' all over 'cuz it's a cooool neato 'buzz' word.

Looks like the Pio univeral player I have in that package too.
 
Probably costs about $100-120 or so now so maybe ~$280-300 for the Rec section?

I'm betting it's just a cheapo rec.

I've seen 'little' Recs. like this from other companies.

Seems to be the new thing trying to make stuff 'small' for the masses. Someone's gotta prove to me that it's got digital amps in it though.

[Jay S]

There is very little info on the EX-500.  It is not even clear if it is a true digital amp.  No mention at all on what chips it uses, etc.    

Frankly, the only thing that makes it interesting to me is the room correction.  Other than that I'm keeping an eye on on the new Panny models.  While they don't have room correction, I want to see if they cut corners vs the XR45 or raise the bar in terms of sound quality.  If they raise the bar then, who knows, the generation after that may have it all.

[azryan]

If it's not digital amps then it couldn't say what chips aren't in it right? I maybe be wrong but I'm betting it's not a digital amp.

As for room correction... not really the place to talk about it here I guess but I'm not big on the idea at all.

Peter T. is sure against it! hehe

IMO you can't distort your speakers to compensate for a room echo effect.
To a microphone and test tones it might look like the sum of the two =fixed/flatter but one's the original speaker wave and one's an echo.

I know a lot of people love the TacT room correction but it's a can o' worms IMO and adding DSP processing into the signal path too.

Leave the speaker's designed to be flat alone and fix the room that's doing anything bad IMO.

The only thing I really see 'room correction' as being a good idea is to fix any bass peaks you might have.
That'll work good if you need it but that'd be just like wanting a few parametric digital e.q. points in a processor.

Anyway... there's levels of how advanced a room correction systems is I'm sure and I'd HIGHLY doubt that Pio. has the  level of complexity as advanced as the TacT where you can really adjust a lot of parameters to fix better.

If you 'correct' your speakers at one point, they'll be more distorted everywhere else 'cuz a room doesn't have the same effect everywhere.

The TacT lets you measure several spots and take an avg. and then adjust that on a computer etc... like a kinda sorta correction trading less reverse room distorting as one key point for keeping things more even in several seats.

Seems like most people were making custom curves to color the sound in diff. ways. Not my thing at all.

Clearly the most dramatic effect people claim is fixing the bass in people's rooms. That's just e.q. though.

I don't see why people would even want/need to e.q. the top end. It takes very little to damp out treble room reflection and that's not ness. a good thing to kill that IMO.

Yamaha's top recs I think have 'room correction' program in 'em. Maybe look into those. I'd bet it sounds better than that little Pio.

I still REALLLY doubt you'd ever trade your eARTwo for one though.