[LeadEars]

Hello everyone,

First, a statement of the obvious: I'm introducing myself.

I'm here because I decided some months ago to replace my aged Adcom GFA-555 power amp, which is getting very noisy on one side.  Being on a "fixed income" and a tight budget, that was obviously going to be a challenge, given my champagne taste from decades of conrad-johnson, Nottingham, Adcom, Focal, Tara Labs, etc. in my systems.  All of that's gone now, except for my early-90's conrad-johnson Premier 17 preamp & SoundSmith Norma cartridge.  For the rest of my system, I'm running Ascend Acoustics ELX RAAL towers, a Rega Planar 6 turntable, Hagerman Trumpet phono stage, Oppo BDP-83SE disc player, and Cambridge Audio AXN10 streamer.

After weeks of sifting & sorting www info, I decided to pursue an Odyssey amp, set up an eBay search & made some preliminary contact with Mr. Bunge via email.  Then I saw a 5-year-old Khartego Stereo SE on eBay, which I managed to snag, so I should be in the Odyssey camp within a week or so.

From reading a lot of posts on this forum since then, I realize it's going to need to be biased - my A/C generally runs 124v - but I shouldn't have any problem doing that.  I'm still trying to figure out the last word on instructions for that, but I did see that the man himself posted somewhere in capitals with exclamation marks that anyone doing this for the first time should call him first, so I'll do that...

I'm looking forward to being in the circle!

Mark

P.S.  The title of this post was chosen because of its several possible meanings and my over-developed sense of humor.  Especially since this is my first post, please do not assume I meant it primarily in the arrogant sense.   

[LeadEars]

My Odyssey Khartago Stereo Extreme (2020 vintage) has also arrived and is now in my system.  I haven't touched the bias yet - I want to talk to Klaus about that - but it already sounds SO much better than my old Adcom GFA-555.

[questz1z]

 Welcome and enjoy your Odyssey!!!

[justjed]

Welcome to the Circle! Rest assured, I can appreciate your sense of humor!

Be sure to let us know how this turns out. I have an upgraded Khartago SE Extreme
and a Candela preamp. Better is not something I feel the need to think about.

[AllanS]

Welcome aboard! Fortunately good audio doesn’t have fortune. I love what David and team do at Ascend.

[SteveFord]

Good move holding onto that preamp.

[LeadEars]

Thanks everyone!

@SteveFord: I've always loved c-j stuff & I wish I could've held onto my Premier 140 tube amp & Premier 15 phono stage, but they unfortunately didn't make it when I moved to a smaller place.  The 140 isn't a good fit for Texas anyway though - too much extra cooling required, not long enough winters.  Of course, if I still had it, I wouldn't have the Khartago - a listening comparison between them would be very interesting!

@AllanS: I"m going to be posting something specific about the Odyssey on the Ascend Acoustics forum soon, because the Khartago has almost completely solved a really weird problem I've been struggling with, and thought was a room problem: muddy bass.  The Adcom GFA-555 was as famous for its excellent bass as it was for its fatiguing highs, but it was the bass I had a problem with, so I didn't suspect the amp.  Without going into all the detail here, as I have on the Ascend forum, I'll just say that very specific (& non-WAF friendly) base treatment was necessary for the speakers to make it unobjectionable, but it's almost completely gone with the Khartago.  I suspect the aging GFA-555's damping factor was minimal, or something like that.  At any rate, the improvement with the Khartago is incredible, and by no means confined to the bass - there's no area of the music presentation that hasn't gotten better, and most are hugely improved.

[Letitroll98]

Klaus is a night owl, don't call early, as in before noon or 1 o'clock.

[LeadEars]

I haven't attempted to talk with Klaus about biasing my Khartago - I'm sure he's rushed off his feet this time of year and should also be getting to enjoy some down time over the next couple weeks, too.

I still have an open question out there, though, one that I thought anybody here who has biased their own amp would know the answer to:  If the mains voltage goes up, does the bias shift toward "warmer" or "cooler"?