It is fair to assume that a purpose-designed preamp is better as a preamp than a purpose-designed amplifier that is also a preamp. If you are made of money and/or intent on min-max'ing every aspect of your system, Serene + Bliss is no doubt the way to go. But for us normal folks, Bliss is...

Forza Noir Hybrid. I use Verite Silver with my Caldera, but Forza Noir Hybrid with my Utopia, to GREAT effect. You can certainly get better, fancier cables than Forza, but you can't get better value for your money, and I would put it right on par with ZMF's own cables.

I get how you might find a lot of her more modern stuff too "out there" to enjoy. Personally, I can't get enough; I think she's an artistic genius. Next year is my 50th birthday and I'm actually planning a trip to Iceland for it, in part to hopefully catch her DJing in her hometown, Reykjavic...

Staging "better" and staging "wider" are not the same thing. One is too often confused with the other. Caldera and Susvara both stage "better" than HD800S, but neither stages "wider". HD800S has an artificial widening that blows out the sound so that it is all around you, but never touching...

Fantastic review, thanks for sharing! :)

I actually don't doubt it, unless they come up with some sort of headphone tech that literally emulates a 3-d soundscape. For binaural sound, I'm not sure perfection can be improved upon.

Ok, I'll grant you that wasn't her BEST album. LOL But there is also this...... :D

Bjork is my favorite artist of all time, I've listened to this song literally thousands of times. It has SO MANY layers and textures and rhythms going simultaneously. Just now, listening to it on Susvara for the first time, a particular passage sounded "wrong" to me for a moment, until I...

Yeah, not so much anymore. ;) And 1-bedrooms start around $1M now, or $6k/month rent. And so I might as well spend my money on headphones, right? Because that condo I lust after ain't happening either way. lol 🤷‍♂️

Caldera is SO pretty. 1266 is, err well, 1266. :wink: TBD. Not enough people have one in hand yet to know for sure. But those that do have it are saying it is at least competitive.

Cough.... Caldera. Cough.... ;)

Great review. With Lampizator as a DAC I would be surprised if Aperio WASN'T better than HE-1. Question is, what happens if you feed Lampizator into HE-1's amp? :thinking:

Yeah, May takes a few months to arrive, but my Bliss arrived like 3 weeks later, too. Congrats! :)

I've always found this to be true. Soundstage width and "dynamic slam" have an inverse relationship. The bass is either right up in your face or it's pushed out slightly away from you. The dB level of the bass makes no difference to this effect (i.e. you can EQ HD800S all you want, you will...

I feel like Empy & Atrium are almost redundant in that way? Both are relaxed listens that lean in more to smoothness and euphony than resolution or detail.

This is one of the most beautiful things about headphones, IMO. Verite did that for me & jazz. I had always liked jazz, but never really knew where to begin. But something about Verite screamed out for jazz and I went DEEP down the jazz rabbit hole - and never came out. :D

Sus & Caldera are both amazing headphones that sound nothing like Empy, but they are very different. If you want ultimate resolution, clarity, & timbre, Susvara can't be beat. Caldera is warmer, with bass that is clearly in the running for best bass in head fi. I might say Caldera is...

I see both sides of this. You weren't impressed with Bliss, and that's totally valid. But you are also VERY vocal about it, telling every single person who gets Bliss that it's not good enough, when in reality its designer used Susvara as his reference. Your opinion is valid, but maybe don't...

Fwiw, much to my surprise I've found Stellaris and Susvara to be an excellent match. It takes 70-80% on the volume pot to really drive Sus to its max, but at that level, despite my best efforts to confirm what the common wisdom says should be the case, I can't hear any weakness, lack of...

I'm partial to borykworkshop, but nonetheless, *favorited* for future reference.

I don't know who she is either, but that's probably because I'm gay and don't really care. Unless she's wearing Immanis, in which case I'd really like to see. :heart_eyes: lol

Co-pilot Pad. I owned an ironwood Verite that weighed over 600g - with the co-pilot pad all I felt was a soft comfy pillow on my head. As far as the neck, I don't think there's an answer for that except to choose a lighter headphone.

Lots of talk of Takatsukis in threads for amps that use them. Their 2A3 is the premium tube of choice in DNA amps. I don't know how their 300B stacks up to WE's, but I think most people with a 300B amp would more likely go for the brand with the long heritage.

To be fair, Goldensound also said there was a real case to be made for Wavedream to best May in a lot of ways. I ultimately went with May mostly because I have a hard time believing the cost differential is worthwhile, though I have to admit I do sort of resent being mandatorily tethered to...

I like re-reviews every few years of enduring staples of the hobby like Susvara, to see how they stack up against what has come out and what the reviewer has learned & experienced in the intervening years. It always fascinates me how 99% of models come and go, replaced by something newer and...