Steve Deckert
|
Yes, the pairing with the ZF15L baffles are out of this world good. It will be hard if not impossible to best this combination. That said, I'm off to try - leave no stone unturned.
I listened to the entire 80 minute album of Tool today and I have to say it was the best recorded metal group I have ever heard. Just outstanding with this combination. It was so good I'm still craving more. Going to any other speaker will not be the same because nothing has the hit of the ZF15L speakers. They make the music get serious real fast. It caught me by surprise because before I knew what happened someones YouTube request caused me to find myself transported to an audiophile quality heavy metal concert where not a single note sounded bad and things were occasionally pushed to a point of complexity that I wouldn't have thought anything could reproduce it without shifting into the dreaded sounds like crap zone...
But, this amp is so disarmingly smooth that I thought the highs were rolling off a bit, that must be it... They aren't. Still, I really wanted to hear the very top end of this amplifier, so I have flipped the room and am now listening to it on my house speakers. There is no better tweeter that I have heard or midrange for that matter so they are a great tool for measuring amplifiers. Also the imaging is like 4K compared to everything else being HD.
So far the sound is just exquisite. Prior to hooking these up, I tried the Tube Tots, but didn't like the placement where I had them, or something because they just sounded a bit rolled off on the top. Or maybe it was just the shock of changing from the ZF15L. I will revisit that again.
I can tell I'll be on the house speakers for the rest of the week. I'll make some more videos this weekend if I get time. The resolution is breathtaking... everything is so musical and juicy. It is wonderful to hear so much resolution in the top end as the ZF15L are rolled off by 15KHz and I was hoping the amp didn't sound that way on everything!
I can't really speak to how this amp compares with our other offerings, other than the midrange liquidity is more obvious. I am still wiring my brain for this new sound. It takes weeks. This sound doesn't fit into my processor and it is making it impossible to fully ... process. I am wired to the core for the Zen Triode SE84 sound using that wonderfully fast and neutral sounding video tube. The amp you really can't hear. I can definitely hear this amp... OR is it that what I think I can hear is actually there and I couldn't hear it before. ee, this is processor burning out it's cooling fan.
I don't know why I let you guys get me into to this crap ; )
Hell, I'm still trying to figure out how much of this is the driver stage (almost all of it like I suspect) or the output tube. The problem is that despite being based on the same SRPP stage I use in Rachael, it's not the same. The 300B takes a LOT more drive than an EL34, 6L6 or even KT88. So the gain structure I showed you will not work the same in any of our other amplifiers making it impossible to know what they would sound like with the same driver stage. Like all of my stuff, the circuit slowly builds itself.
|