Hi, I am 100% new to this forum and this Promitheus thread...........
This is probably the opportune time to jump in and pay tribute to Nicholas and Promitheus. I just finished my 2nd round with my REF3 TVC (dual mono, 1 box). Mine is copper-wired. Based on my limited past experience with silver-based wires (Kimber, for example), the sound would be too bright for me.
Having read the tremendous postings in this thread, and exposed also to the TVC in person, I decided to take the plunge and ordered the REF3 and requested Nicholas that it be copper-wired. When it first came in, about a month ago, DHL really screwed up. It was deliverd to an unknown party. When I saw it again at the local DHL warehouse, there were signs of it being re-sealed. So I turned down the delivery. Those tri-cycled delivery guys (vs. a DHL truck guy) probably didn't give the package (or any package) any due care, not to mention professional care. I personally saw the way packages are thrown around by DHL, UPS, and FedEx truckers. Just saw it so when I passed a UPS truck last week. The guy threw the boxes from standing inside the truck, 5 ft. in, toward the rear of the truck. For a few days DHL could not track down and retrieve the delivery (I called them repeatedly and they offered no answer). Nick immediately went back to the assembly line to have another one put together for me. While I waited for the re-dlivery, I wrote my complaint to DHL headquarters.
Not to be too long-winded, I cooked it for about 100 hours, using a portable Sony Walkman CD player. The sound at that point was not impressive at all. Then, Rollo, the man who started it all, told me it would take 450. So, for the last week, I cooked it again with the Sony. Today, I took a listen again in my system. I discovered the sound has changed significantly (and likely will improve more I hope), with much better spatiality, to further embellish it, more dimensionality, much more expansive. The sound is also livelier as a result. But... it somehow seemed veiled and lacking clarity. All this time, a Cary AE3 DIY preamp was used, with rectification (added a rectifier to mimmick the AE3 DJH factory version). The AE3 itself is very good with the mids, very sweet I supposed because of oil caps used, so sweet that it may be a bit heavy in the middle. I thought perhaps that was the reason. So I switched in the AE3 DJH factory version. The DJH version has shown to be more resolving and dynamic than the one I put together. Indeed it is. The factory version somehow is a bit less sweet than my DIY. I think that's because their configurations are different. The result is a more dynamic and transparent sound. I had been complaining about my Meridian 508.24 being old and lacks somewhat in transparency. In fact, I have started to research on how to mod it, hopefully to improve the sound. Now, with the TVC, the sound has improved transparency, soundstaging and imaging. Definitely it's more than a notch above the old setup. Now, I probaly will spend some research time to tweak the TVC first.
Hats off to Nicholas and Promitheus. I was going to write Nicholas a personal e-mail, but then changed my mind, thinking a more public statement here is more appropriate.
The Promitheus TVC definitely is a very worthy product. It should perhaps see more wide-spread distribution here in North America. Thanks Nicholas.
