I finally bought an integrated amp. I thought I’d post my shopping experience since I asked quite a few questions on this forum while I was trying to decide what to do! This is a long post, I’m sorry and I hope I won’t bore you too much with it.
A few months ago I just had an Arcam HT receiver with a Cambridge DVD player. I wanted nicer sound for redbook CD.
So I first bought a Denon 2900 DVD but this was even worse than the Cambridge for 2 channel music. Well, back to shopping and I bought an Arcam CD23T player, wow, that was a good decision, now music was really good but still not quite what I wanted.
Back to shopping again, for an integrated amp this time. In order to make a good decision, for most of what you will read below, I did an a/b test between the amp in question versus my receiver. In some cases I brought the amp home, in other cases I brought my gear to the shop.
Here it is, please don’t expect too much from my comments, I’m just a regular joe that likes to listen to music. I’m no professional audiophile that uses all the perfect words to describe his emotion and opinion!
- Creek 50Air : Smooth and warm sound but not a big enough improvement over my Arcam receiver so it’s not worth it to change.
- Myriad Z140: Similar impression to the Creek, I actually prefer the Creek.
- Moon I-3: Very clinical, it seems to be doing everything perfectly but does not bring much emotion in me while listening, not my kind of sound I guess.
- Shanling STP-80: Wow, quite a soundstage and the voices sound like the singer is right there in front of you. However, this was using the Shanling CD-T100 player, when I switched to another CD player (a Moon), it was still nice but definitely not as impressive. An interesting option but I would prefer a regular closed metal box that you slide on your rack shelf instead of this shiny metallic box with the tubes sticking out! Personal taste.
- Jolida 1501RC: Nice, smooth and warm sound, not bad soundstage, very good price but missing some detail in the music, basically again a bit more interesting than my receiver but just not enough of an improvement. Plus, when I brought it home, there was interference and I was earring some noise coming out of my speakers.
- MusicalFidelity X-150: This one seams to do everything well but nothing stellar. Generated no emotion on me.
- AudioRefinement Complete: Kind of similar clinical sound to the Moon, it’s very nice to listen to but there is just no wow factor! I think for the price it sell it’s not a bad deal tough.
- Unison Unico: Hummmm, very nice, a lot of detail but warm and smooth at the same time, that one I like.
- Unison Unico I: Very similar to the regular Unico, even more detail in the music but a tiny bit aggressive on the highs in certain songs.
- Leben CS300: Hummmmmm, similar impression as the Unico but more of everything. This one is a killer at its price however there is no remote for the volume and that is a must for me. Too bad.
- Audio Aero Prima MKII: Hooo, very very detailed and transparent, I have not heard such an amount of detail in any of the above with a good recording. The soundstage is very good, the sound is warm, voices are natural and the highs are not harsh or aggressive. This is what I really like, natural voices with plenty of detail but not aggressing your ears with the highs. The power may seem low (50w) on paper but I can't see ever using more than half of the volume level this thing can go to.
So I ended up buying the Audio Aero. I’ve been listening to it for a week now and there is no more listening fatigue that I sometimes had with my Arcam receiver. A review I read on the Audio Aero CD player really sums up my feelings with the integrated but with nicer words than what I can write:
“There is much extra detail revealed, compared to other CD players. But, interestingly, this detail does not sound analytical or overwhelming. It is not artificial, glossy, surface detail pasted on top of the music. Instead, it is almost subliminal, woven into the fabric of the music itself.”
As you can see, I’m quite happy with my decision and on top of it, I got a deal on a barely used one. At its full retail price I might have overlooked the Audio Aero because it would have been a bit higher than my budget. Since I got it for less than a new Unico, although it’s not new, I think I was quite lucky.
Hope this is useful to some of you who are shopping.
