Well the new girl has about 30 to 35 hours up now and I'm pleased to report she is quite settled in and is now an integral part of the family. I'm getting to know her better and better and with reflection, I have the impression that there has been a small and gradual smoothing out of sound over the period to date though there has been minimal obvious change since the first 5 to 10 hrs or so.
So what have I listened to over the period? A lot of classical to get a feel for layering and stage size, a fair bit of Rock to see how well it handles complex and often compressed recordings, some 'electronica' to hear non standard instrumentation and my own particular favorites including all flavors of female voice and jazz.
The best way to summarise the 2009 Soraya is that it just does everything superbly well - this amp is not limited by musical genre IMO. I won't be boring and describe everything I have listened to but there were a few things that provided a pleasant surprise. Rock for example. Rather than my existing impression of most rock CDs being somewhat discordant and harsh, many such as Wolfmother actually appear quite well recorded and now sound very good indeed. Roger Waters and Pink Floyd are more ethereal than ever and Goldfrapp and other electronic music come across as very clean, precise and highly listenable.
I had earlier commented on the general clarity, detail and drive giving great presence and refinement and I now think of the amp as both vivid and vital. Oddly, the increased base extension, so obvious at first, I hardly notice now with gained familiarity - it's as if the Soraya simply provides the performance anyone would naturally expect of any amp down low.
I have also realised that the mid and upper base detail and speed I had previously noted, in reality extends across the whole frequency spectrum. It certainly remains more instantly noticeable down low but can be clearly heard in the initial instant of a string pluck or piano note be they high or low. So whilst I've previously mentioned how well voice and drums are handled, what has rather blown me away during extended listening has been the superb presentation of piano and guitar. There is nearly always a small but realistic imparting of impact energy to be sensed or heard and this punchy underpinning along with the increased detail and clarity really drives the musical reality of the notes. Tommy Emmanuel and Sam See guitar and Keith Jarrett piano recordings for example are now simply exquisite to listen to and I'd forgotten how good Sky really is.
There are still no negatives IMO. 99 out of a hundred CDs and LPs have really come out of their shell and I'm having a ball listening. I had thought early on that perhaps the increased resolution might reduce the previous warmth somewhat and/or make poorly recorded material unlistenable, but I've been pleasantly surprised on both counts. No the new presentation is not warm or coloured of itself but it is simply crystal clear and neutral. I leave the warming to my GK1. There is none of that etched or over sharp feeling that some SS amps have - rather like when one overuses the sharpness control on a TV. There is just a clean, incisive and natural leading edge of notes and superb decay as well. Any muddiness, resonance, reverb etc. one hears is simply from the source. As to poor material, I've rather unexpectedly found that the new clarity quite often actually helps but with one exception though, where bad compression artifacts such as clipping are engineered into the recording, the faithful reproduction of same can be just too much of the wrong information.
In summary then, all is very well indeed in my listening room. KK and others, you are in for a treat.
