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eclein - Nice looking amp.The title says possible Giant Killer - What amps have you compared it to besides the Sony and the Virtue Audio?
Ed MADE me buy this so I’ll elaborate a bit more on his review. I finally received mine as well. Was a bit worried for bit but it was worth the wait. I also have a very low level hum only noticeable through the phones. Any source easily overrides it but still annoying to an extent. Might be any easy fix – we’ll see what the manufacturer says. Not noticeable through speakers (I’m using it near field in my computer set up in my home office – about 3 ft distance). Speakers are Polk RTi A1 (89dB sensitivity). Source is Asus Xonar D1 card with FLAC files (16/44) and some hi rez downloads of various rates.First off, this thing is very well built for the price. The speaker binding posts aren’t the best but are spaced for larger spades and tighten down nicely. The XFMR is very heavy which usually indicates good E core steel stack. The tubes lock into their sockets very snug. The toggle switches lock with a solid “click”. The volume pot is not dampened but rotates smoothly. The chassis is well finished and solid materials were used. The rear panel has an IEC AC socket and 2 pair of generic gold plated RCA connectors with decent grip. Overall, a very attractive package – and the handles on the top of the chassis are a nice touch and handy if you want to move it around.Using the stock tubes currently. Using speakers - out of the box I wasn’t all that impressed. It sounded overly bright with little drive at the bottom. After an hour or so it started to warm up a bit (or I got conditioned!) and the harshness gave way to a nicely detailed top end with a forward presence. The bottom is a bit soft but nicely rounded and not lacking in frequency response. Plenty of drive for fairly efficient speakers but then again my office is a standard bedroom sized room. Maintains it’s detail at low volumes nicely too.Headphones – Grado 225Si. Other than the low level hum it is a great headphone amp. Very detailed with good “space” in the midrange. Can be a bit harsh in the high end depending on the material played but I can say the same thing about the big rig downstairs – just more noticeable with cans on. Again, not much slam on the bottom end but very smooth and well rounded. That might change as it breaks in a bit and/or I try some different tubes.Giant killer? I might not go that far but definitely a bargain for the price and a real solid hi fi amp that doesn’t disappoint.
All those little things he did added up to crystal clear, dimensional sound to me...its hard to write what I'm hearing and sounds more twilight zone then hifi but its there and I could hear it an hour or two in........very cool, did that help???
Nonewell the other MP301If people are upset with my wording, phrasing, use of punctuation, etc. just let me know and I'll stop posting. I enjoy having fun with this hobby but I'll stop if its annoying people-just let me know.
I hope you're not thinking that I was poking or anything. I have 3 SE amps in my house ranging from $350 to about $1K, so I know you can get a lot for the $$. I've never compared them to anything very expensive so I sometimes wonder how they rate, which is why I asked what you compared this amp to.
AVNerd--re: humming, did you get the version with the Grado mod, or standard 50-600 Ohm headphone ouput?89db speakers that both you and Ed are running are pretty inefficient. I wonder how bad the hum would be on horns or fostex single drivers.
How many hours so far? New tubes sound like what you're describing until 30 hours or more.
Indeed. That's what I put it down as. Have been burning the unit in and it cetainly tamed down quite a bit. I have some other tubes that i can experiment with later to see how I can shape the sound to my preferences.
