[gancanjam]

I have received mine and would just want to tell people to shut up and listen to music, with the May if possible. It will change you.

One of my amp is Flux FA-10 , also looking at Volot which is supposed to be it's bigger brother. Could see you own Volot which is very rare to audition. How is May + Volot ? if you have listened to FA-10 then how do you compare Volot and FA-10?

 

[XVampireX]

One of my amp is Flux FA-10 , also looking at Volot which is supposed to be it's bigger brother. Could see you own Volot which is very rare to audition. How is May + Volot ? if you have listened to FA-10 then how do you compare Volot and FA-10?

I don't own the Volot unfortunately, still running it through my Soundaware P1
I'm not sure about the Volot anymore because there are almost no reviews of it.
I'm thinking of just waiting until Holo Audio Bliss....

 

[gancanjam]

Really good advice! So much of this thread is much ado about nothing. I listen with my ears. Until they develop an audio approved listening bot I'll trust my senses above measurements. Oh, but then you tell me the bot is programmed by a human. oh my.

Haha ...I have brought few devices based on measurements recommended by the community ...but never worked out for me.. I got one amp with one of the lowest SNR but I did not liked it sound signature works better for me than numbers on a piece of paper. Given a choice I listen to it, if I don't get the chance to audition then at least I understand how it sounds by community impressions which can give some guidance ..EDIT: numbers & technology are the last thing I worry about except for a vital number such as power output ... as always YMMV !

 

[sajunky]

Can someone explain the point of contention in this thread? (1) Is someone saying that Holo is not true NOS? (2) Or is this about some sort of filter that’s purpose is to make Holo DACs measure better?

(3) What is this cryptic “go find the evidence yourself” game that seems to be going on?

(4) Who is JA?

#1. Yes.
#2. Both. Holo DAC use DSP filtering and a presence of digital filtering is proven in JA test of May. And YES, such application cause Holo DAC to measure better. Not only digital filter makes Holo DAC to measure better, but also other techniques like noise shaping or scrambling (dithering). @GoldenOne is a propagator of using HQPlayer for better measurements (proven) and (allegely) better sound explaining it in this post:

HQPlayer though is different as it is an oversampling player. The combination of high performance oversampling AND high performance dithering/noise shaping can have quite an impact on sound (and is measurable). So whilst yes, each DAC will react differently to different source tweaks,

The answer comes from the horse mouth, it is measurable. If Holo DAC deploy similar techniques, it measure better. A presence of digital filter is an external indication that something more is happening behind the scene, not only digital filtering.

Implications of #1 combined with #2:

@GoldenOne keep claiming that Holo May is true NOS. A definition of NOS comes from the hourse mouth in the test of Terminator+:
"Looking at NOS first; NOS means non-oversampling. The DAC does not do any interpolation or filtering in the digital domain"

Further @GoldenOne express strong condemnation of the Denafrips for using false marketing:
"I do not know why these seemingly false claims about the product are made, especially when it objectively performs very well for an R2R dac, and subjectively sounds very good. There does not seem to be much reason to lie, but whatever the reason, false marketing should always be called out even if the product is otherwise very very good (which the T+ is, it sounds great)."

How important is for a DAC to be a true NOS again comes in the same post linked above:

HQPlayer benefits some DACs more than others, and NOS DACs benefit more because you can guarantee that there is no further DSP, dithering or other alteration going on and therefore the benefits of HQP's noise shaping and filtering can work to the fullest extent. Many DACs you can use HQPlayer's excellent noise shaping but then your DAC's own dithering will effectively bury/ruin it.

With all above the only bone of contention is deploying in Holo Audio digital filtering.

#3. Cryptic is because it is better if you find it out yourself. It can't be cryptic for long.

#4. JA test is linked on the top.

 

[GoldenSound]

JA test is linked on the top.

And as another user already pointed out, JA in that very article says:

"Ignore the very small amount of symmetrical ringing before and after the single full-scale sample, which is due to the antialiasing filter of Audio Precision's A/D converter operating at a sample rate of 200kHz"

You then claimed that JA was wrong:

JA has skills and years of experience, I can't believe that he made such a wrong assessment.

This is not true at all.
You cannot capture a square wave, true NOS impulse response, or other signal that has content outside the nyquist frequency. It is mathematically impossible.

When we generate as perfect a square wave as we can, it looks like this, that is assuming you have sufficient bandwidth, in the case of this screenshot, the ADC is running at 2.5mhz.

Now if we change nothing other than the ADC sample rate, to the 192khz that JA was running:

Now we can see that the square wave is not perfect. Not because it isn't perfect in reality, but because we are not sampling at a high enough bandwidth to capture it. If we look in further we can see the ringing artifacts more clearly.

If we reduce our ADC sample rate to 44.1khz then because of our further reduced bandwidth limitation, this effect gets stronger:

We can even use a minimum phase filter on the ADC and the type of ringing changes:

So as John Atkinson said in that article. The ringing shown on that IR is due to the ADC sampling rate he was using. There is no such thing as infinite bandwidth, and no amount of production, mastering etc will change the basic principles (nyquist theory) upon which digital audio works.

If you have some actual evidence for your claim that Holo is using DSP (or any of the other claims you've made about various products then refused to back up), please share it.
Otherwise please stop making unsubstantiated claims about brands you don't like, and picking/choosing information to craft the story you want to tell. You can't use JA's graph as 'proof' but then say that his explanation of said graph is completely wrong....

 

[Rukley]

For primarily headphone listening what would be a good equivalent amp pairing for the May KTE, I'm upgrading from a Qutest / Phonitor XE, placed my order for the May KTE earlier. Don't really have a budget but would be willing to shell out for something equivalent.

 

[GoldenSound]

For primarily headphone listening what would be a good equivalent amp pairing for the May KTE, I'm upgrading from a Qutest / Phonitor XE, placed my order for the May KTE earlier. Don't really have a budget but would be willing to shell out for something equivalent.

The best amp honestly depends on which headphones you're driving. I don't think there is one singular best amp for all situations.

 

[Rukley]

The best amp honestly depends on which headphones you're driving. I don't think there is one singular best amp for all situations.

I currently have the OG Clear but I'll be ordering the Utopia at the end of the month and am waiting to receive my set of Verite Closed.

 

[GoldenSound]

I currently have the OG Clear but I'll be ordering the Utopia at the end of the month and am waiting to receive my set of Verite Closed.

OG clear can honestly be driven on a fairly wide range of stuff. It's not super amp picky (and not too hard to drive).

The VC though I personally found that it was wayyyyyyy better on warmer amps. Cayin ha6a and the susy dynalo mk2 were wonderful with it.

Gsx mini is a great option.

If you're mostly going to be using VC I'd honestly look at getting a tube amp. But the gsx mini would be a more well-rounded option for other stuff

 

[Rukley]

OG clear can honestly be driven on a fairly wide range of stuff. It's not super amp picky (and not too hard to drive).

The VC though I personally found that it was wayyyyyyy better on warmer amps. Cayin ha6a and the susy dynalo mk2 were wonderful with it.

Gsx mini is a great option.

If you're mostly going to be using VC I'd honestly look at getting a tube amp. But the gsx mini would be a more well-rounded option for other stuff

I do plan on getting a tube amp in future but it's not on my radar right now, I love my clear and will likely use the Utopia the most based on how I liked them during my demo time. The rest of my budget right now was set aside for rounding out my desktop set up.

I was originally saving for a Dave or TT2 + M scaler but after watching videos on YouTube and finally being able to find one to demo I fell in love with the Holo May, so I dropped my plans for the Chord life and ordered it, now I just need to round out the setup. I was looking forward to the Bliss but heard it had been pushed back, so now I'm stuck between finding a dedicated headphone amp or getting a Serene and seperate power amp.

 

[GoldenSound]

I do plan on getting a tube amp in future but it's not on my radar right now, I love my clear and will likely use the Utopia the most based on how I liked them during my demo time. The rest of my budget right now was set aside for rounding out my desktop set up.

I was originally saving for a Dave or TT2 + M scaler but after watching videos on YouTube and finally being able to find one to demo I fell in love with the Holo May, so I dropped my plans for the Chord life and ordered it, now I just need to round out the setup. I was looking forward to the Bliss but heard it had been pushed back, so now I'm stuck between finding a dedicated headphone amp or getting a Serene and seperate power amp.

I wouldn't go for a power amp for utopia/VC.
Its definitely worthwhile for Susvara/he6 and possibly 1266 but for easier to drive stuff it's not really the way to go.

The SA-1 is a great lower cost amp and performs like a champ. The ability to adjust output Impedance is also really nice.

The serene is actually probably my fav headphone amp by itself, but it's xlr only, no single ended.

 

[Rukley]

I wouldn't go for a power amp for utopia/VC.
Its definitely worthwhile for Susvara/he6 and possibly 1266 but for easier to drive stuff it's not really the way to go.

The SA-1 is a great lower cost amp and performs like a champ. The ability to adjust output Impedance is also really nice.

The serene is actually probably my fav headphone amp by itself, but it's xlr only, no single ended.

XLR only isn't really a dealbreaker for me as I'd planned on going the XLR route with my Utopia anyways so that wouldn't be a dealbreaker.

I'd appreciate any recommendations to look into though, I live in a more rural area so demoing stuff is a real challenge for me without knowing well in advance what I want to try then try to make arrangements and a trip for it.

I hadn't thought of just using the Serene by itself, but I'll definitely check out the SA-1 and any other suggestions. Thanks for the help!

 

[gancanjam]

I currently have the OG Clear but I'll be ordering the Utopia at the end of the month and am waiting to receive my set of Verite Closed.

My Utopia sounds great with Holo May + Simaudio Neo 430.. Neo does have mixed reviews in the community though. The safer bet will be Benchmark HPA4 amp which is recommended by some key May owners, an used one is not super expensive and not going to be much more pricier than the SPL Phonitor you are considering. Very difficult to find fault in HPA4 as it does not do anything bad. Holo Bliss is certainly an option as well if you can wait a bit but audition may be difficult.

 

[Rukley]

My Utopia sounds great with Holo May + Simaudio Neo 430.. Neo does have mixed reviews in the community though. The safer bet will be Benchmark HPA4 amp which is recommended by some key May owners, an used one is not super expensive and not going to be much more pricier than the SPL Phonitor you are considering. Very difficult to find fault in HPA4 as it does not do anything bad. Holo Bliss is certainly an option as well if you can wait a bit but audition may be difficult.

Yeah, I actually lucked out and after posting elsewhere about being unable to demo anything Holo Audio near where I live somewhere reached out and allowed me to demo theirs. Other products from the line will likely be impossible though.

I had looked at the HPA4 in considerations so I'll have to revisit that. @GoldenOne recommended the HeadAmp GSX Mini so I'm now looking at that and the GSX mk2, which looks promising.

I do plan on getting a tube amp but it won't he until next year probably and was considering either the Cayin HA6A, or the Feliks Euforia which I've heard pairs very well with the Utopia.

 

[RustyGates]

@GoldenOne Is it possible you can review the iCAN Pro Signature with the May?