Wow Tao, I'm impressed!
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Originally Posted by saint.panda
Marcel and I did some extensive comparisons with a Dynamight and it does seem like a very unfair comparison at first, $400 vs. >$2000, but still a valid one imo. In any case, we used three different sources (a McCormack UDP-1, a high end Dodson DAC and my custom cd player) and source differences were more apparent on the Corda than with the Dynamight. Does this tell something about neutrality or accuracy? I don't know but I did wonder why the Dynamight sounded pretty much the same regardless of the source used and I doubt it's a matter of impedance mismatching.
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Indeed, and I was very puzzled about this isue. The DynaMight simply sounded like the Dynamight, independent of the source!
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| As expected, the Dynamight did things like soundstage, transient response, bass impact or resolution better but I found the Aria prototype to be the more musically involving player, a bit warmer and with what seemed like a better sound integrity or coherency. |
I agree on this.
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| ...you just can't deny the Dynamight's greatness in the bass. Summing up however, I found it to be somewhat cold and detached sounding most of the time. |
In fact there wasn't a single moment where I was really impressed by the Dynamight's presentation: much too cold and uninvolved/uninvolving.
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| I think a Dynamight with a different tonal voicing would be spectacular. |
I think it already
is kind of spectacular as it sounds now -- but I'm not obliged to be impressed anyway, am I?
The Aria (prototype) on the other hand is exemplary for an unspectacular sonic presentation. It even doesn't have the HA-2 MkII's omnipresent smoothness which can sound so appealing and offers that special «high-end» feeling. Its own characteristic is a bit drier -- and more accurate instead! This may be the right place to elaborate on the Dynamight's effective «technical merits». Although it certainly gives the impression of high accuracy, resolution and control, how much does its output signal have in common with the input signal? Remember: an amp ideally should be an amplifying piece of wire, not a euphonic effect device! But how can the deviation from the original signal be verified? Well, it's not that hard to do...
Paragraph for the technically interested
...all you need is a stable low-impedance (> 200 ohm) line-out from a DAC or CDP. Now connect a pair of 300-ohm Sennheisers to it (of course you need a matching adapter) and maybe a 500-ohm potentiometer. You can renounce the latter and choose a low-level music passage on a CD or use your DAC with your soundcard (...or just your soundcard) where you can adjust the volume level. And now compare the two signal paths -- one directly from the line out and one through the headphone amp (ideally by means of a splitter cable to be able to have both amp and headphone adapter attached to the line out at the same time). Now the question is: How does the headphone's relatively low impedance affect the line driver amp (given that it's designed for loads in the 50-kOhm range)? It can be tested with a second 300-ohm headphone plugged in the headphone adapter attached to the line out in parallel to the amp: Does plugging in... unplugging... etc. affect the sound heard through the headphone amp? If not, you can be relatively safe that the sound heard from the headphone connected directly to the line out represents the original signal -- just modified by the headphone's own colorations.
Interestingly the two most expensive amps I've tested extensively in my setup were the ones with the highest inaccuracy relative to the original signal: RudiStor RP5cav and Dynamight, the latter even worse than the former, although less euphonic in its characteristic, especially due to its uninspiring midrange. Both of them had the property to exhibit their technical or sonic merits in a mannered way and to distract from the music itself. The RP5cav with its sonic beauty (as well as artificial space and drama), the Dynamight with its «resolution» and «control» (with imperative quotation marks in view of the effective inaccuracy).
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| What the prototype did better than the HA-2 MkII was imo a more natural and effortlessly sounding treble. I've always found that compared to the Prehead MKII and other amps like the PPX3, the treble on the HA-2 could sound a bit strained (even more so on the MkI than on the MkII) so I really welcomed the change the Aria prototype brought. |
I agree with your findings. It has to be mentioned that it's not the original HA-2 MkII, but a HA-2 updated to MkII level by Jan.
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| Soundwise, there's nothing to complain about at $400 but faced with more expensive and imaginary competition, I think the Aria could use more bass slam and a bigger soundstage (mostly in width). A lot of amps I've heard have a better (and for me that means bigger) soundstage and it's something I'd love to see in a Corda amp as well. The soundstage is very consistent, quite holographic, has good depth and height and is well-focused but I wouldn't mind more soundstage width. The bass tends to be on the leaner side. Some people like that refined tightness but personally I really like the bass slam some tube amps have. This is not to say that the Aria lacks bass but there's always that extra miniscule improvement to wish for. |
I partly agree on the bass -- but it's by no means thin or lean. It is a tiny bit less full than the HA-2 (MkII) -- and the direct connection to the UDP-1's line out --, especially in the upper bass, but in turn the low bass seems to come more into its own. I'm not very sensitive to soundstage when it comes to headphones, but I really appreciate an accurate spatial depth of the instrument placement, and I don't notice any shortcomings compared to the direct connection and even think it does a better job than the HA-2. This thanks to its high degree of transient accuracy and its excellent texturing -- that's where it's superior to the HA-2 as well as to any other amp I've auditioned in my setup. Together with a quite neutral sonic balance this makes it the most neutral and accurate amp I've heard.
What about weaknesses? Like the great majority of pure solid-state amps I've heard so far it slightly tends to make the sound harder, less smooth and less liquid. Thus the opposite of tubes which tend to make it softer and more liquid. Whereas the HA-2 MkII -- slightly untypical in this regard -- combines (overly) liquidity with hardness, the Aria prototype manages to sound more organic despite (or because of) its drier, more accurate presentation. In fact it sounds quite a bit more focussed than the HA-2 (MkII) throughout the frequency spectrum, but at first listen it is the less spectacular and less euphonic amp. What's obvious after a while is its higher dynamic contrast -- blacker blackness between the notes. Nevertheless, it still sounds «better» -- in the sense of more euphonic -- than the direct connection. And it reacts extremely well to different cable characteristics -- this could be filed under the positive aspects --, it's easy to restore smoothness and liquidity that way -- although the sound won't correspond exactly to the original signal then. Long story short: It's clearly my favorite dynamic amp to date.
I'm not a dye-hard direct-path advocate. I think in view of the sonic imperfection of the digital format(s) a little bit of forgivingness makes sense, and be it by means of a slight coloration added by the amp. But why should I want to pay thousands of $ for higher colorations and a more spectacular sound than the original signal? My benchmark will always remain the original signal. That's why you'll never see me own an amp that costs more than say $1200.
