JoeDoe
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That is a very kind gesture. Now the pressure is on, the next meet must be even bigger and better than the last!
+1 and +1!
Music City Meet -- Spring 2015 -- Pics & Impressions Thread
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+1 and +1!
MattTCG
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Great looking hp's sir. Hope they sound as good as they look!
phillyd
500+ Head-Fier
Before long he'll be getting a set of Sennheiser Orpheus HE-90's every meet 
skyline315
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Well deserved, Burnley.
My final (condensed) take on the Project Ember. Also posted in the Ember thread:
Finally got a chance to audition the Ember, thanks to Thujone.
First off, Jeremy over at garage amps is fantastic. When the amp arrived at my house it had a damaged power switch (thanks USPS). Jeremy sent me a pre-paid shipping label and had the thing back to me in under a week, fully fixed and ready to go.
My chain has been Modi 2 U --> Vali --> HE-500. With the Ember, the majority of my listening was done with the stock tube. It reminded me of the Vali in that you could certainly tell you were listening to a tube amp, but not in a syrupy/smeared sort of way.
I've always enjoyed the 500s...first from my Asgard, and then from the Vali. I still maintain that the Vali is a good match for them. That said, the power provided by the Ember takes them to another level. In short, it grabs the 500s by the balls and makes them sing. Ample power, while still retaining a very clean/refined sound.
When I first received the amp, it was set to medium impedance and low gain. I had to get to about 12 oclock on the volume dial to get to a place I liked. And, while it was good, I wasn't blown away. It was a step up from the Vali in terms of clarity. I could hear deeper into recordings and notice a lot more tiny detail than I could with the Vali. But, at nearly 3x the price? That was a tough sell for me.
After contacting Jeremy, though, he recommended low impedance and high gain. That did it. More authority in the bass, more drum impact, driving guitars...all the good stuff. And still, it sounded clean, polished, and refined. My only complaint here is that there wasn't enough play with the volume...9 oclock was pretty much it. 11 oclock on really uncompressed music...classical, choral, etc. Apparently one of the features of the new Ember 2 is the ability to readjust the volume knob range via an input attenuation module. Pretty awesome feature.
Speaking of customizable, you can also adjust the impedance as I mentioned earlier, the gain, and whether or not you want to bypass the input caps for a purer signal. All of these settings can be changed on the fly without turning off the amp, which makes A/B listening very easy to do. And, while it has nothing to do with sound, you can also change the color of the LED under the tube, or just turn it off completely.
These all worked well. I plugged in my DT1350s, and of course had tons of hiss due to the high gain/low impedance. So, I switched to high impedance/low gain, and the 1350s sounded great. There was still not a pure black background, but the background noise was barely audible with the music paused. Already an advantage over the Vali, which doesn't play nicely with those particular headphones.
The cap bypass feature was interesting. It may be placebo, but the sound did seem to improve when the caps were bypassed. Sadly, though, the volume knob became very noisy when adjusting the volume which caused me to go back to using the input caps. According to Jeremy, this can be very tube dependent with some being far noisier than others. There was also a little scratching with my 1350s by the way, even when going through the input caps.
All in all, the Ember is now on my list. Once I save up the cash, I plan to add it to my lineup. I wish I had a pair of 250-300 ohm headphones to try on them, but I have to imagine they would sound fantastic with all of the tuning options that the Ember provides. I'm looking forward to hearing more impressions from more experienced ears. It's a real shame there isn't more talk of these amps. Here's hoping that will change soon.
My final (condensed) take on the Project Ember. Also posted in the Ember thread:
Finally got a chance to audition the Ember, thanks to Thujone.
First off, Jeremy over at garage amps is fantastic. When the amp arrived at my house it had a damaged power switch (thanks USPS). Jeremy sent me a pre-paid shipping label and had the thing back to me in under a week, fully fixed and ready to go.
My chain has been Modi 2 U --> Vali --> HE-500. With the Ember, the majority of my listening was done with the stock tube. It reminded me of the Vali in that you could certainly tell you were listening to a tube amp, but not in a syrupy/smeared sort of way.
I've always enjoyed the 500s...first from my Asgard, and then from the Vali. I still maintain that the Vali is a good match for them. That said, the power provided by the Ember takes them to another level. In short, it grabs the 500s by the balls and makes them sing. Ample power, while still retaining a very clean/refined sound.
When I first received the amp, it was set to medium impedance and low gain. I had to get to about 12 oclock on the volume dial to get to a place I liked. And, while it was good, I wasn't blown away. It was a step up from the Vali in terms of clarity. I could hear deeper into recordings and notice a lot more tiny detail than I could with the Vali. But, at nearly 3x the price? That was a tough sell for me.
After contacting Jeremy, though, he recommended low impedance and high gain. That did it. More authority in the bass, more drum impact, driving guitars...all the good stuff. And still, it sounded clean, polished, and refined. My only complaint here is that there wasn't enough play with the volume...9 oclock was pretty much it. 11 oclock on really uncompressed music...classical, choral, etc. Apparently one of the features of the new Ember 2 is the ability to readjust the volume knob range via an input attenuation module. Pretty awesome feature.
Speaking of customizable, you can also adjust the impedance as I mentioned earlier, the gain, and whether or not you want to bypass the input caps for a purer signal. All of these settings can be changed on the fly without turning off the amp, which makes A/B listening very easy to do. And, while it has nothing to do with sound, you can also change the color of the LED under the tube, or just turn it off completely.
These all worked well. I plugged in my DT1350s, and of course had tons of hiss due to the high gain/low impedance. So, I switched to high impedance/low gain, and the 1350s sounded great. There was still not a pure black background, but the background noise was barely audible with the music paused. Already an advantage over the Vali, which doesn't play nicely with those particular headphones.
The cap bypass feature was interesting. It may be placebo, but the sound did seem to improve when the caps were bypassed. Sadly, though, the volume knob became very noisy when adjusting the volume which caused me to go back to using the input caps. According to Jeremy, this can be very tube dependent with some being far noisier than others. There was also a little scratching with my 1350s by the way, even when going through the input caps.
All in all, the Ember is now on my list. Once I save up the cash, I plan to add it to my lineup. I wish I had a pair of 250-300 ohm headphones to try on them, but I have to imagine they would sound fantastic with all of the tuning options that the Ember provides. I'm looking forward to hearing more impressions from more experienced ears. It's a real shame there isn't more talk of these amps. Here's hoping that will change soon.
Burnley that is just too cool. They look like nice headphones. For my first meet I don't think things could be organized any better. Well deserved .
Porteroso
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Ok, so it's getting to be that time. I do not mind helping to setup a small summer meet, but we need to go ahead and agree on a time. I will assume that we want to do it near Nashville, and it needs to be on a Saturday. No need to mess around with a Friday meetup, we're already having big meets twice a year for those who want to spend more time in Nashville due to travel.
Does anyone have any strong preferences on a date? And if you're interested, please go ahead and let us know below, even if you've already said something. I imagine we'll need space for about 5-15. Those of you who live in Nashville would know better than I about spaces. If there is a vendor that had room, that would be the best case scenario. They probably would not charge us, and we shouldn't need too much space.
If we could try to get this hammered out in the next week or so, that would be best. If it doesn't happen, that is fine too, but there are some things I would love to hear, and I don't think I'm alone.
Does anyone have any strong preferences on a date? And if you're interested, please go ahead and let us know below, even if you've already said something. I imagine we'll need space for about 5-15. Those of you who live in Nashville would know better than I about spaces. If there is a vendor that had room, that would be the best case scenario. They probably would not charge us, and we shouldn't need too much space.
If we could try to get this hammered out in the next week or so, that would be best. If it doesn't happen, that is fine too, but there are some things I would love to hear, and I don't think I'm alone.
goropeza
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Hammered out by next week? For me living in TX thats a bit too soon to get my affairs in order. Do you guys usually do a fall meet?
Porteroso
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They do a fall meet, yes (at least I think that is the plan). There were some of us that were not able to attend the spring meet, so we wanted to see if we could get together before the fall one. We do not have to decide on a date by next week, but it would not be terrible if we did. If there isn't any interest, that's fine too.
I don't think Porteroso meant that it would be held next week just hammer out a time and date by then if I get his and your meaning. I only have been to one meet but I believe they have two a year Spring and Fall.
You can count me in on a meet just about any Saturday other than the 4'th of July.
yes, we've been doing a spring, and fall meet,
i missed the last meet, so i would be interested in a "mid summer classic" lol
i missed the last meet, so i would be interested in a "mid summer classic" lol
MattTCG
Headphoneus Supremus
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phillyd
500+ Head-Fier
Listed my Momentum 2.0's. They're great but I haven't used headphones portably once since I've gotten em. I'd rather have a pair of HD600/650 or just cash to save up and get some planars.
I would go for a pair of HE400's they are pretty cheap same price as hd 600's and sound better for most things IMHO don't own them just listened to them but I can't go away from planar's. I liked the Momentum's but I like my Alpha dogs and He 400's more. If I had the money I would have a pair of Either's they are just that good. Hd 800's don't come close IMHO but I did like the Grado GS 1000's so lite and airy and nice sounding.
phillyd
500+ Head-Fier
If you like light and airy, then I don't think our tastes are similar enough to make your recommendations terribly accurate. I agree wholeheartedly about the Ethers though they are fantastic.
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