mrarroyo
Headphoneus Supremus
- Joined
- Jul 27, 2005
- Posts
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- 43
First I would like to thank Nick20 for organizing the event. Choosing the Embassy Suites was a great idea, I learned they have large size rooms with conference tables that will seat up to 10!
To me the best part of the meet is that it brought together a nice bunch of head-fiers w/ great gear! Sadly, some who had indicated would show up were not able to do so. Bad for them but great for those who made it! more time to play w/ the toys.
I will say that for me the best and also the worst was listening to the Denon D5000. We had an stock one, one w/ Mark's mods, and one w/ Mark's mods and a Jena re-cable. The first two had only about 25 hours but you can definitely hear the significant improvements brought upon by Mark's mods. Earlier in this paragraph I wrote "worst" and it was in reference to my wallet, I will be saving $ to order a D5000 and then have it modded by Mark. At this time I would be happy w/ just the mods, hard to justify the price of the re-cable. Of course things could change and ...
For those that have not had an opportunity to listen to an stock and a Mark modded D5000 you are in for a treat. IMO the mods allow a level of detail and clarity to come through not possible w/ the stock version. In addition there is a sense of layering and depth that the stock does not possesses, heck to me the Mark modded was also more comfortable.
Of all the gear I personally took to the mini-meet the one that has me most excited was a brand new development by Graham Slee. Graham has designed and built a new amp, the Novo. This little jewel (IMO) is a fully discrete offering which he will be selling for $400 plus S&H. The amp as stated is a fully discrete and comes with a wall wart providing 24 vdc and meeting all the latest environmental rules. Thus the "green" label. Note: I brought along the upgraded PSU made by Graham the PSU1, and we could not hear a difference over the "green wall wart". To me that speaks very well of the little wall wart and its implementation, heck I even placed an aftermarket power cord on the PSU1 and the sound was the same as the "green wall wart". I will not comment on what I think of the "Beta Novo" until the other participants in the mini-meet post their impressions on it, I will say that the unit only had about 25 hours of burn in. I am really looking forward to getting at least 200 hours of burn in on the "Beta Novo" and then do an in depth review.
The Novo amp I took along is a beta version. If you look closely at the edges there is still some work with the case to make sure the edges overlap correctly, something Graham is working on w/ the shop fabricating the cases.
For those of you who own or plan on purchasing the Ultrasone HFI-780 we had two, one fully modded by ALO and the other by APureSound. Opinions were split, I prefer the APureSound as well as another head-fier. Another head-fier preferred the ALO w/ the Jena re-cable. Actually both are fantastic and a heck of an improvement over the stock ones, but I just preferred the sound of the APureSound re-cabled can. I might add some cotton balls to the chambers to see how the sound changes.
I just got back from Orlando a few hours ago and have been spending the time putting everything back in their place. Boy you forget how much gear you take along to meets until you have to restore your system.
I will close by once more thanking Nick for a job well done! The food, drinks, and cookies were a very nice touch. Finally some pics.
More impressions to follow tomorrow, after I rest. Besides I have to do some work in preparation of Fay!
To me the best part of the meet is that it brought together a nice bunch of head-fiers w/ great gear! Sadly, some who had indicated would show up were not able to do so. Bad for them but great for those who made it! more time to play w/ the toys.
I will say that for me the best and also the worst was listening to the Denon D5000. We had an stock one, one w/ Mark's mods, and one w/ Mark's mods and a Jena re-cable. The first two had only about 25 hours but you can definitely hear the significant improvements brought upon by Mark's mods. Earlier in this paragraph I wrote "worst" and it was in reference to my wallet, I will be saving $ to order a D5000 and then have it modded by Mark. At this time I would be happy w/ just the mods, hard to justify the price of the re-cable. Of course things could change and ...
For those that have not had an opportunity to listen to an stock and a Mark modded D5000 you are in for a treat. IMO the mods allow a level of detail and clarity to come through not possible w/ the stock version. In addition there is a sense of layering and depth that the stock does not possesses, heck to me the Mark modded was also more comfortable.
Of all the gear I personally took to the mini-meet the one that has me most excited was a brand new development by Graham Slee. Graham has designed and built a new amp, the Novo. This little jewel (IMO) is a fully discrete offering which he will be selling for $400 plus S&H. The amp as stated is a fully discrete and comes with a wall wart providing 24 vdc and meeting all the latest environmental rules. Thus the "green" label. Note: I brought along the upgraded PSU made by Graham the PSU1, and we could not hear a difference over the "green wall wart". To me that speaks very well of the little wall wart and its implementation, heck I even placed an aftermarket power cord on the PSU1 and the sound was the same as the "green wall wart". I will not comment on what I think of the "Beta Novo" until the other participants in the mini-meet post their impressions on it, I will say that the unit only had about 25 hours of burn in. I am really looking forward to getting at least 200 hours of burn in on the "Beta Novo" and then do an in depth review.
The Novo amp I took along is a beta version. If you look closely at the edges there is still some work with the case to make sure the edges overlap correctly, something Graham is working on w/ the shop fabricating the cases.
For those of you who own or plan on purchasing the Ultrasone HFI-780 we had two, one fully modded by ALO and the other by APureSound. Opinions were split, I prefer the APureSound as well as another head-fier. Another head-fier preferred the ALO w/ the Jena re-cable. Actually both are fantastic and a heck of an improvement over the stock ones, but I just preferred the sound of the APureSound re-cabled can. I might add some cotton balls to the chambers to see how the sound changes.
I just got back from Orlando a few hours ago and have been spending the time putting everything back in their place. Boy you forget how much gear you take along to meets until you have to restore your system.
I will close by once more thanking Nick for a job well done! The food, drinks, and cookies were a very nice touch. Finally some pics.
More impressions to follow tomorrow, after I rest. Besides I have to do some work in preparation of Fay!