Cavalli Audio Liquid Fire - Page 7

I don't know of any.  I was a Woo WA22 owner and you could get close to the price once you upgraded tubes but not near the performance.

I can't think of any headphone amp close to the current price of the LF that I would rather own.  Some amps synergise well with a few headphones, but the LF has excelled with every headphone that I own and I have quite a few.  I haven't posted much here because I'm too busy enjoying this incredible amp.  I have no desire to own any other amp.

I guess price is relative when you are talking about the LF or what you are willing to pay for a sound sig, it seems to be in a class by itself. Yes this amp does make all my headphones sound there best (for my ears), and yes I have never heard a amp quite like the LF and I have had a lot of amps including vintage and modern speaker amps.

However this is not to say this amp is for everybody, if you like a wall/blab of sound coming from your headphones I would think a cheaper tube headphone amp or a vintage speaker amp my be more to your liking.

In my case I love the detail, spot-on direction, depth, 3D like sound-stage, sonics, dynamic range, neutral sound sig, impact, and on and on with no ear fatigue this amp gives me. But of-course if the info is not in the audio the Liquid Fire is not going to magically remaster the audio.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sachu 

This!!!!

The Liquid Fire has taken my audio rig to new heights, literally and figuratively.    Its incredible how the presentation has lifted from 2-3 feet high to full on lifelike height in terms of imaging.

I thought my Magnepans did bass well enough, but dang you gotto hear it with the Liquid Fire. The difference is nearly as big as different speakers.

Your above-quoted opinion is regarding your prototype LF, is that correct? or do you have both the production and proto models? Whichever you're using at the moment I know it sounds incredible.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sachu 

This!!!!

 

The Liquid Fire has taken my audio rig to new heights, literally and figuratively.    Its incredible how the presentation has lifted from 2-3 feet high to full on lifelike height in terms of imaging.

 

I thought my Magnepans did bass well enough, but dang you gotto hear it with the Liquid Fire. The difference is nearly as big as different speakers.

 

 

 

 

 

In my case I can compare different speaker system (up to 7.1), room acoustics, amps, etc, using my headphones, Liquid Fire, W4S DAC, BDP-95 (using its HDMI port 2 for digital audio out to the in HDMI port of my Realiser) and my Realiser using the Tactile outs to my Crowson Tactile system (for the LFE CH) and Toslink to my W4S DAC then out to my Liquid Fire .

As I have stated before the Realiser will give you the illusion (using headphones) of you setting in the sweet spot of any given speaker system, and its for that reason why I just can not get over how well the Liquid Fire projects the sound-stage, with so much accuracy, detail and depth/3D.

I use my personalized PRIR's from AIX sound studio's out in LA.

I just listened to "Us and Them" MFSL CD and had a near religious experience.  The bass on that reaches low and is one of my audio test tracks for any system.  It was exceptional but going into the windup at the end the bass hit all time lows for headphone listening plus everything was clear as crystal (Not the loud mix of mush you can get sometime) and the shear impact of the whole experience felt like I was going to get knocked out of my chair!  I went for another test track "Run Like Hell" from The Wall MFSL CD.  Delivered the same smack down.  I've put more hours on the LCD2rev2's which has helped.  Just when I think I'm getting "used" to this I am amazed again.

Just to throw my two cents in (or less than that, given the state of the economy), I haven't heard anything at the price point of the LF or below which I would rather have.  Granted, my experience is somewhat limited, but I really think when you start getting out to this area of price you're usually talking about good equipment that is going to appeal to people completely dependent on their tastes.  Some people might like more color, or more treble, or more weight, or more...I dunno...name your flavor.  I've only really heard one amp that I MAY see myself liking more than the LF, and I think that had as much to do with the setup of the entire rig as with the amp as an individual unit.

The LF gives you a great window into the rest of your chain.  It gives you all the extension up and down that you would probably need without adding anything negative in itself.  With the right equipment, it gives great bass, good treble extension, clarity, imaging, and transparency.  Like sillysally alluded to, however, it's not going to create some kind of black magic and give you something that isn't there in the source material, and it won't spontaneously create something that isn't within the capability of your rig.  This is kind of a good and a bad, but like the Stacker II lets me really listen to differences in the tubes that are rolled in, the LF really lets me listen to the sound that is in my chain without any heavy gimmicks.

I just tried a friend's liquid fire recently with my LC 2.2s. One word, beautiful. Smooth, powerful, detailed. I loved the sound. They were imo as good if not better than my woo audio 5, depending on what your priorities are for the amp. I'm currently considering getting this but probably will wait till the Schiit Statement Hybrid Amp comes out and will choose one of the two. :)

Has this amplifier been compared to Apex Peak/Volcano ?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Audio-Omega 

Has this amplifier been compared to Apex Peak/Volcano ?

Not that I've read.

However, I have the Peak/Volcano.

And hope to have the Cavalli no later than tomorrow.

So...  unless someone else wants to step up, looks like I'll be posting the comparison in a couple weeks.... 

Yes they have http://www.avguide.com/review/three-top-tier-headphone-amplifiers-hardcore-high-enders

Before I owned the Liquid Fire I too had a Woo WA22 that is one of the comparo's here w/the Apex as well.  The Liquid Fire outperforms the Woo in every way.

Thanks for the link. 

I'm looking forward to your review.  

Liquid Fire #20 has arrived.

I really must say, it has been one heck of a wait, though.

It shipped last wednesday via priority mail.  A delivery metohd that normally takes 2 to 3 days.

However, the amp took until today to get here.  8 days.

I was a little worried, needless to say.

Anyway...  On first impression, it was pretty stiff sounding right out of the box.

But, after 30 minutes of warm-up the sound is already pretty impressive.

I can't wait to get 150 hours on this bad boy.

Also.  The attention to the presentation of the amp was great.

The cloth cover, the dummy plug, the nice instruction booklet. 

Very nice touches.

Still don't understand how a piezo switch works.  But oh well. 

Cheers and happy listening!

The Wuss