[sacd lover]

I will get the ball rolling here. go_vtec is in the market for another tube amp so he came down to listen to mine. In addition, mikey01 was able to make the long drive too so a three man mini-meet developed. We had a wide variety of amps, headphones and sources but unfortunately not much listening time. I wish we could have had 5-6 hours more listening time. I got to listen enough to have some basic opinions but thats about it. These are two fine gentlemen and I enoyed having them here. You guys are welcome anytime.

The gear at the meet is as follows.....

Amps: Mapletree ear + with added mods, Eddie Current hd 25, Headroom MAX, double modded Sugden, Singlepower mpx3, Singlepower supra 6cg7 prototype, Singlepower mpx3-6cg7.

Sources: sacdmods 555es, sacdmods 963sa, Mikes sony player and I dont remember what mikey o1 had. You guys will have to fill in what you brought.

Headphones: sennheiser hd 650 x2, grado rs-2, grado sr-225, beyer dt 880, cd3000 and an older pair of sennheisers that I dont think anyone tried. I will have those senns in the mail for you Monday mikey, you forgot to take them.

As this meet was more about trying stuff we all took a short listen to the various gear. The big surprise for me was how good the Mapletree Ear + sounded. This amp was very good with my grado sr-225's and nearly as good with the senn 650's. Ths amp is small, cute and sounds very dynamic and punchy. This amp reminds me of the original ppx3 with its rich mids and speedy transients. This amp deserves more attention.

The next big surprise was how good the Eddie Current hd 25 sounded. The amp was dead quiet and had a nice open and dynamic presentation. I also liked the amp had a lower gain which allowed me to have good range on the volume control. The hd 25 drove both the grado sr-225, sony cd3000 and senn 650's wth ease. Interestingly, I preferred the senns over the low impedence headphones with the hd 25. I know the builder and atleast one member prefer the grados. To be honest I didnt like the very similar hd 300 because of power supply hum and general noise issues. I also didnt think the hd 300 sound was very refined with a noticeable tonal hardness as well as a bright upper midrange that made guitars to thin. The hd 25 was well balanced, warm and has a smooth tubey character that was very musical. The Ear + and the hd 25 were what I concentrated on and I really liked both of them. I wanted to try the hd 25 as a preamp since the lower gain may have worked nicely with my monarchy sm-70 pro, alas, not enough time.

I spent some time with the dt 880(for a member) to see how they mated with the singlepowers. I didnt hear the sibilance that bothered me with the original ppx3 and this pairing. The new ppx3 has definitely moved more towards the mpx3 sound. Now as a comparison, I thought the mpx3-6sn7 combo was as good as anything I have heard them on. Furthermore, I liked the 6cg7 prototype and the dt 880 best of all. The dt880 is a little to thin sounding and the treble seems disproportinately detailed for my tastes, personally. But if you like the headphone you should like the dt 880 with a ppx3. I wish I had tried the dt 880 with some of the other amps but I never got to it.

I had the cd3000 on for a brief listen on the hd 25 and I just dont like this headphone. I heard that same treble tizziness that always bugs me with this phone. I did think it sounded better on the 6cg7 prototype but I like the grados much better. The grado sr-225 and the singlepower 6cg7 prototype are awesome together; noticeably better than even the sr-225 and the Ear+. I might even prefer the grado sr-225 to the senn 650 on the prototype.

The only downer for me was the mpx3-6cg7. I have had this amp on all week trying to get it burnt in for the meet. For the past several days it has varied from great... to dull, dark and closed in. I spent half the night last night rolling tubes, power cords and switching sources. I thought I had it perfect for these guys but when I turned it on today it was dull again. I have the solen 3 in this amp and I wonder if there is just to much bass for the more limited treble extension(vs the 6sn7 tube) of the 6cg7 tube. I think I would stay stock if I went with the mpx3 using the 6cg7 tube, for those of you thinking about one of these models. The loss of speed and dynamic punch in the lower registers, compared to any of the prior 6cg7 amps I have owned or auditioned, makes me believe the solen 3 probably goes to far with this tube. This upgrade would likely sound great with a 6sn7 tube based singlepower that has the treble extension to balance the sound. Maybe I will change my mind if the amp opens up. I was told the mpx3-6cg7 needed two hundred hours use for those big caps to form(appox 140 hours right now). I sure hope so.

I know I got a steal with the old chassis style mpx3 I bought. This amp has been excellent since the day it arrived. Put good tubes in the mpx3 and it does everything right. The ken rad 6sn7gt/ sylvania 6sn7gt combination is heavenly exactly like many have stated in Hirsch's tube rolling thread.

I will stop here and let the others contribute. Go_vtec took a bunch of pictures for you and he will be posting them for you later.

 

[acs236]

I wish I could have been there.

All those amps would have been tempting. I supposed my next project (purchase) should be a source.

 

[bg4533]

Where in Ohio are all of you? Where was the meet?

I am in Columbus, a student at OSU. I would love to go to one of these meets, but I know I shouldn't. I have nothing worthy to contribute and I know if I go to a meet I will feel the need to upgrade all of my equipment.

 

[Mikey01]

I am sure everybody is welcome, equiptment or not. I was sure glad to make the mini-meet. I look forward to many more. Meeting Mike (VTEK) and Earl (SACDLOVER), just made my day . They were two great guys. And again a special thanks to Earl and his wife for letting us do this or hosting if you will.
As far as equiptment goes I could only sample with the time permitted (my own fault). I have just bought an older MPX3 that has not arrived yet so I wanted to here Earl's. As I had suspected, it is a tremendous amp as are all SinglePowers. I pretty much cuncure with Earl and Mike on the findings toward the sound of all the amps so I won't go too much farther there and my findings are the same as Earl's and multitudes of others on the SinglePowers. HOWEVER: SinglePower is well plugged here by everyone and rightfully so. I whole-heartedly agree with that. BUT I was also delighted to see two other fine amp makers hold there own in this same arena. The two being the MapleTree Ear+ Extream and the Eddie Current HD25. I kept telling Earl "you gotta here the HD25, it ain't anything like the HD300". Well finelly he did as you have read. I feel that the MapleTree is not quite to the degree of the MPX3 (as far as stature goes) but very close and for half the price it is a killer sound and very well refined. It is a transformer driven sound as opposed to otl as is the HD25 also. Transformer driven don't sound too bad EH! I felt, IMHO, the HD 25 is the equal (in stature) to the SinglePower MPX3. It is dead quiet, overkill build seperate power supply, well filtered and regulated. The sound is very well articulated and refined. The differences were like compareing a Lincoln Town Car to a Cadillac DeVille. Both are very nice and in the same league, just different. Non is richer than the other to speek of. The MPX has a beautiful gloss like finish and nice styleing where the HD25 is nice but dull black, BUT has a seperate cabinet for the powersupply giving it an impressive look. And so it goes. Again the MPX3 had a bit more tubey lushness being OTL whereas the HD25 has a more wide soundstage and a bit brighter detail being a transformer type. But I certainly would not want you to think that the HD25 is a bright amp because it is not. The sounds, on all the amps in this review had a pretty well balanced sound. So you listen to them and "nit-pick" over the small neuances seeing which one you like best. I could not help myself here as I liked them all very well. I hope this cleared things up.............What the #&%:?># did he just say?

 

[adhoc]

Quote:

Originally Posted by sacd lover The big surprise for me was how good the Mapletree Ear + sounded.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sacd lover The next big surprise was how good the Eddie Current hd 25 sounded.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sacd lover I know I got a steal with the old chassis style mpx3 I bought. This amp has been excellent since the day it arrived.

so, if everything sounded 'good', which did you prefer the most?

 

[sacd lover]

Quote:

Originally Posted by adhoc so, if everything sounded 'good', which did you prefer the most?

The supra 6cg7 prototype is actually my favorite amp by a good margin. Of the three you mentioned I like the mpx3. Senn 650's are my favorite headphone and the mpx3/650 combo does everything right together.

 

[go_vtec]

Well, it was very nice to meet couple of excellent headfiers in person. This time, just like last time, we had too much gears, so we barely had a time to listen all the gears. My day started at 7am so that I can prepare my custom CD just for the reviews. However a minor car trouble (flat tire) put me in two hour delays. Well, I forgot to eat my breakfast and lunch, but the meet was worth it. Originally I was planning on doing a detailed review, but I can only go for impression this time. May be I will get a chance to do it again once my RKV MKII with Impedanzer gets here. When I got to the meet, I realized my digital camera was complete out of battery. I fully charged it few nights before, but I didn't realized that my wife was using to picture/video our son night before the meet.

Luckily we had SCAD_LOVER's Kodak to rescue us for not having any pictures. Since I am not so good with point-and-shoot camera, I did what I can to capture the Singlepower mini-head quarter in Ohio. I'll post pictures, then impressions later today (be warned, there are tons of them).

 

[go_vtec]

Well, here is one of my favorite shots

Here are pictures of Singlepower family, MPX3 6sn7 (closest), black maxed out MPX3 with 6cg7 (middle right), and Supra 6cg7 prototype (far on the back).

Here are another shot of Singlepower amps, MPX3 6sn7 (far), black maxed out MPX3 with 6cg7 (middle), and Supra 6cg7 prototype (closest).

A lovely view of 6sn7 tubes on silver MPX3 (only if those NOS tubes were more affordable

.

Picture of listening station 1, sourced by Sony SCD-C555ES and powered by black MPX3 6cg7 on the top left and 6sn7 MPX3 on the top right.

Close up of two MPX3s.



May be I'm the only one that digs the industrial look of original MPX3? Blue capacitors are nice classical tough. Here are the pictures of MPX3 with NOS 6sn7s.

Here we have SACD_LOVER's maxed out black 6cg7 MPX3.

Well, we can't leave out the Supra 6cg7 prototype with tube rectified power suply in a separate housing.

 

[Mikey01]

That was pictures of one part of the room. Wait till you see the rest. Some funny mug shots too. I just loved the time there. Next time I will be there all day. It was great. My fav was SACDLOVER's "Prototype". It was to die for. If I were still foreman of a sheetmetal shop, I would form and weld up a couple of real nice cabinets and paint them piano black for him to set everything in. Then it would look more/better than his new MPX3. But I can't now, oh hum.
How could anything get better than a Supra prototype anyway. What I really diden't get enough time in with were thies two great HeadFiers, Earl and Mike. This is one great, but abiet expensive, hobby. Not just in equiptment but this HeadFi board and the people behind it all. I think it's time for a group hug and a mug shot. We'll need an extra wide angle lens. Oh BTW, Mikes Headroom Max was one of the best solid state units I have heard. I need more time on it though. I used an automobile analogy in a previous thread above. I failed to fit in the Ear+ Extream. If the MPX3 is a Cadillac, and the HD25 a Lincoln Town Car, then the Extream would be a Buick Park Avenue. There.

 

[acs236]

Mikey -- Are you referring to Earl's Supra Prototype? Doesn't he have an MPX prototype too? I remember really liking the Supra, but the MPX would be more price-friendly.

 

[go_vtec]

Mikey is refering to the Supra 6cg7 with tube rectifier (silver one that you heard last time). I don't think the silver MPX3 is considered a prototype. It's a pre-production type

 

[elnero]

If I remember correctly Earl has the Supra two box prototype, PPX3, old style MPX3 and a decked out MPX3 - 6CG7 version.

 

[sacd lover]

Quote:

Originally Posted by elnero If I remember correctly Earl has the Supra two box prototype, PPX3, old style MPX3 and a decked out MPX3 - 6CG7 version.

Almost. The new version ppx3 was an amp Mikhail sent me for the last Ohio mini-meet for the guys to hear. I returned that amp about a month after the last meet. Didnt want to.... but I finally did.

 

[tom hankins]

Sounds like another great time in Ohio.

 

[sacd lover]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tom hankins Sounds like another great time in Ohio.

We need to get you up here for one. If the hockey strike happens you should come up.