I am leaning towards getting an Ayre QX-5 twenty DAC. It has the volume control, so I don't have to get a preamp immediately. I talked to Jake at Ayre and he said they are coming out with a streamer soon but he didn't know there would be a noticeable difference in sound from the Ethernet card. He actually mentioned that without me asking. People in the forums really like the Ayre gear.
Brandon, I ended up getting a QX-5 Twenty recently. I had an Ayre QB-9 Twenty as well, and wondered how it would compare SQ wise (the QX-5 is much more flexible). I've spoken to Jake at Ayre quite a bit and trusted his advice to get it, based on other stuff I have. Anyway, it's friggin' awesome. Incredible clarity. I mean - Incredible. I wanted to "hear" the QX-5, so I pulled the KX-R Twenty and using the QX-5 Twenty as Preamp / DAC into Ayre MX-R monos, or Ayre VX-5 Twenty. I'll probably put the KX-R Twenty back in over the weekend. Really curious to hear what happens... I've tried "going direct" before with not preamp with RME ADI-2/4 Pro. It was REALLY good, but not as good as having my KX-5 Preamp or KX-R preamp in.
A great preamp is additive, in my experience, for overall presence and dynamics. Good conversation here and different ways of getting to great sound. I think this stuff has something important in common though... it's DIFFERENT than the stuff designed to be flashy and talk very little about what's inside. I sometimes wonder how many bother to look into what's INSIDE the equipment, how is it designed, what's the philosophy (do they even have a philosophy other thank flashy casework?),
"How is this amp different than some other solid state amp, besides the marketing materials?"
Notwithstanding any of that, if you want something turn key, that will sound incredible... pickup a QX-5 Twenty and VX-5 Twenty. I think both can be had for ~$10k (used / finding deals) and it can be end game stuff - I think the VX-5 Twenty is that good. The VX-8 may also be a great fit, but if you have interest in QX-5 Twenty, I'd get it. Also, and mentioned before, the VX-5 Twenty (and VX-8) has modules available you can insert for High Pass. It's a very small cap value. Vandersteen does this with their speakers and likes Ayre equipment. They use 100Hz, but I'm sure Ayre will put whatever you want on there. In fact, might not be a bad idea to contact Danny about those small Sonicaps he has. I have 2 different pairs of them from Danny to target 100Hz and 160Hz - in case I wanted to use an outboard box. I think Danny likes the high pass under 100Hz, so I'll probably pick up a batch to try that as well.
This is the high pass module. You'll see the value is .0015uF, which yields 100Hz. That's because the input impedance of several Ayre amps is 2Mohm (balanced) - 1Mohm per leg. So, the cap can be very small and a high quality cap is very affordable.
Anyway, I keep spending money on this gear and speaker stuff from Texas and it keeps getting better - why change? Now I need to hear a ribbon tweeter cross at 1Khz.
