Just got back from John Chapman's Audio gathering

Ravi · « **on:** 9 Feb 2003, 12:56 am »

A great thanks in advance to John for opening his home to us audiogeeks. And as if the great gear wasn't enough, he provides pizza for everyone! There were 30 plus people present throughout the day from my estimation.

I was very impressed with the quality of gear that was used. All amps were of the Tube Monoblock variety (ASL's highend stuff), and ofcourse Bent Pre's (with remote volume, and external halogen tube style volume indicators, very cool!!!). The DAC duties for the CDP belonged to a Perpetual combo.

There were two rooms for auditioning, one was the Theater room which housed Danny's GR Alpha arrays, and the other room had about 10 different pairs of bookshelves and towers, including the GR Criterions. The speaker placement was ideal, distance from rear wall was 4 to 5 feet, and the rooms were quite long, and had some acoustic absorption material is specific areas.

I also got to hear my reference CD on the GR Research Criterions. I know this recording inside out, and have heard it many times. Its a big bonus thats its one of the best sounding CDs I own as well. These are very nice speakers! Smooth as silk from top to bottom. No area of the sound stood out (this is a very good thing), and the sound was beautifull and accurate in timbre and tone. Danny's really outdone himself, but wait until I tell you about the Alpha's.

The Alpha's, mind you being powered by ASL tube monos, still managed to hit you in the chest with very-very deep bass. No distortion at all, and a great sense of balance. They were'nt setup ideally, because they were in the Theater room, so they would get even better if placed closer together (however, they would be blocking the screen). They didn't sound rolled off at all, just pure, and effortless. If you thought tube amps can't do bass, just listen to this combo. Bob from Creative Sound Solutions was playing his CD, Saint Saen, Symphony #3, and the pipe organ literally shook the room. This is as close to a real symphony as I've ever heard. Incredible speakers Danny!

Other favorites were a MTM of all Tangband drivers, made by Al Wooley of Raw Acoustics. They could shame much more expensive sibilings.

All in all, a great event!!! Hope to do this again John.

Ravi

Al Garay · « **Reply #1 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 06:55 am »

Ravi,

Did you bring your Ellis 1801's to the party?
Did you listen to the VMPS RM40s?

Al Garay

audiojerry · « **Reply #2 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 02:33 pm »

Who is John Chapman, what was his audio gathering, and where was it?

Al Garay · « **Reply #3 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 03:46 pm »

John Chapman runs Bent Audio, www.bentaudio.com. He has a forum here in AudioCircle and one in Harmonic Discord. Makes several passive pre-amps using transformers from Stevens & Billington. And he does have demo units so you can find out how it sounds on your system as well. I bought one of the demo units, the TX102S that had been floating around. It needed major TLC, tightening up of things and cleaning up the transformer and John did all that and made it look brand new

He is located in Surrey, BC which is just South of Vancouver BC. He hosted a get together at his house. I was lucky enough to meet him earlier in the week to have my pre-amp, TX102 checked-out and given a complete physical. John not only made my unit look like new, he gave me parts and ideas for my TLP. And also invited me to listen to his incredible systems. He is one of the lucky people to have a set of Alpha LS in his HT system and a set of VMPS RM40s in his testing system.

I can understand why the Saturday get together was so successful. John is one of the super nice guys in audio and it makes it a pleasure to own his gear.

Al

PS. Another plus is he is now selling remote controls. I cannot wait to add one to mine. That will be worth another visit.

audiojerry · « **Reply #4 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 04:15 pm »

Thanks for the info Al.
It would be great if he hosted a session that compared the RM40 to the Alpha LS. He may be the only guy in the world to have both speakers.
What a matchup of heavyweights that would be!

We could even start a pool and place bets!

Al Garay · « **Reply #5 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 06:15 pm »

I bet on the Alphas just because they are much easier to setup and have sounding at their best.

The VMPS RM40s require so much tweaking in order to get right. I'm not confident that I was hearing them at their best. This is not to say that they were bad. Just lacked the openness and detail as compared to the Alphas which were in a different room that was quieter as well. So, I did not have a fair comparison. In the looks department, I thought the VMPS were better looking and smaller... narrower and shorter than the Alphas.

John's wife likes the Alphas better because she uses them to exercise. They have better dispersion, off-axis response, which also makes them better for home theater. Thus, the Alphas are in the HT room. The RM40s are in the lab/testing room, which is not a bad choice to have to test his pre-amps.

I would be glad to have John's dilemma to have to choose which one to use.

Al

Ravi · « **Reply #6 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 06:54 pm »

Al, unfortunately I wasn't able to bring the 1801s. However, I did listen to my reference recordings on the 1801s before I left home. I heard these same recordings again on the Criterion and others. I can tell you, that Dave Ellis has nothing to worry about. I still prefered the 1801s to the Criterions. But it wasn't a world of difference. On my recordings, the 1801s had more detailed and deeper bass, slightly more detailed in the mids and highs. But the difference wasn't huge, and infact, the Criterion sounded better on less than perfect recordings. I'm still thinking of getting them someday. Don't get me wrong, the Criterions are still one of the best speakers I've heard.

Jerry, you've got to hear the Bent Preamp. Its has such incredible rhythm, full of life. He had to have a special motor for the remote volume control, because it is a stepped attenuator, a regular motor could cause it to stop between steppings. It combined with Tube amps gave it a very pleasing balance.

I'll definately attend this meeting again, we had a great time.

audiojerry · « **Reply #7 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 07:19 pm »

Ravi, I'd be willing to try the Bent just because of all the acclaim it's getting, but to be honest, my experience with passive devices in the past has pretty much convinced me that they are not for me. There has always been a noticeable loss in dynamics, punch, and air to the degree that transparency, which is supposed to be the main asset of passive pre's, wasn't enough to outweigh the shortcomings. Plus, there was no remote in the one's I tried.

Maybe if John is willing to let me sample one...

JohnR · « **Reply #8 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 07:24 pm »

John does have a sample unit he sends around.

It's technically incorrect to classify the Bent in the same class as resistive passive preamps. It's no more like those than... um... tubes are like solid state, say

tkp · « **Reply #9 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 07:39 pm »

Quote from: audiojerry

Ravi, I'd be willing to try the Bent just because of all the acclaim it's getting, but to be honest, my experience with passive devices in the past has pretty much convinced me that they are not for me. There has always been a noticeable loss in dynamics, punch, and air to the degree that transparency, which is supposed to be the main asset of passive pre's, wasn't enough to outweigh the shortcomings. Plus, there was no remote in the one's I tried.

Maybe if John is willing to let me sample one...

Audiojerry,

The Bent unit is a transformer base passive preamp. It is very different from any resistive base passive preamp because it took care of the impedance mismatch issue at most volume level. Resistive passive preamps has the clarity but sound lifeless because of mismatching in impedance. I think you will be impressed with the Bent TVC unit.

Ravi · « **Reply #10 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 08:11 pm »

Jerry, like John and TKP already mentioned, the Bent has all the advantages of a passive, without any of the dissadvantages. The transformers I beleive are the main reason for this.

When comparing them to an active Tube pre at Als place, the Bent was actually much more lively, with better bass, and better dynamics. Go figure!!!

I'm intrigued right now with the new Remote control version, but will have to wait till I have some expendable money.

flintstone · « **Reply #11 on:** 10 Feb 2003, 09:29 pm »

I bought the Bent transformer passive a few weeks ago, I have used it so far with three amps and three speaker systems in two rooms. It also works very well with longer cables I have used it with so far. It has made the biggest improvement in sound in my system yet of any component.