[JEspina456]

I picked up a Nakamichi headphone at K-Mart last year for $2.  Yes, $2.  I only got them for my wife because they were purple and her favorite color. Sounded terrible, came in a plastic blister package and were thrown in a large bin of clearance items.
 
Mani Vidar?  The Saga continues...

 

[DigitalFrontEnd]

  I picked up a Nakamichi headphone at K-Mart last year for $2.  Yes, $2.  I only got them for my wife because they were purple and her favorite color. Sounded terrible, came in a plastic blister package and were thrown in a large bin of clearance items.
 
Mani Vidar?  The Saga continues...

Wow. 2 bucks won't even get you a taco anymore.
 
Yes, the evil empire must be destroyed, and Mani Vidar is just the guy to do it.

 

[OldRoadToad]

Whats with the love for VU meters? Unless recording I feel they are a distraction.

​Because  a long, long time ago, in a galaxy that surrounds you, on the same planet as the one you are on now, VU Meters were on some of the best audio equipment made.  And they add even more usefulness and style to said equipment.  Far from a distraction, they are a part of the audio experience. Or not.  If you care not for them, then do not look at them.
 
And it is not "love" but rather admiration.  Love should be reserved for family and friends not inanimate objects or food.  I cringe at "adults" that say "OOooooh!  I just LOVE pizza!" or "I LOVED that car!"   These are the same folk that use the word "awesome" to describe something as pedestrian as (again) pizza when the word should be reserved for the Grand Canyon or the Great Barrier Reef and the like.
 
And no, I am not picking on you, neither am I the "word police".  You asked and I have replied. 
 
To answer those that decry the disgust for MQA shown here I would say this.  There are many that despise what Meridian is trying to do.  If you think it is fine for Meridian to stick their hands up the dress (DAC) of a manufacturer, then remain quiet.  As for me, FTN.  I cancelled both my magazines and told them the reasons why and their slobbering over MQA was but one of those reasons.  The attitude of frAudiophiles here, in magazines and through out the interwebs  is one of the elitist which is why I refer to them as the pigs of Animal Farm.  All animals are created equal but some animals are more equal than others. 
 
Do you want a bunch of pigs dictating what you buy?  Fine.  Line up at the trough.
 
And again, I am not picking on any here.  Example - I like VU Meters and if they never put them on any Schitt product I can either not purchase their equipment, buy their equipment and  just live without the VU Meters or just not buy Schiit and purchase some thing else from a manufacturer that does equip their stuff with said meters. 
 
If I do not want MQA and it is own every thing because the ENC crowd demands it so, then I am forced to pay for it.  And all because MQA says so.
 
ORT

 

[Ableza]

VU meters on home audio equipment are now what they have always been: useless.  But just like flashing LEDs, gold-plated knobs and remote-controlled headphone amps, some people like useless things.

 

[TonyNewman]

 
...  - I like VU Meters ...
 
ORT

 
I love the meters on the front of my Accuphase P-4200 power amp. Very 1970s retro.
 

 
I know they are just audio bling - but I LIKE this bling.

 

[OldRoadToad]

  VU meters on home audio equipment are now what they have always been: useless.  But just like flashing LEDs, gold-plated knobs and remote-controlled headphone amps, some people like useless things.

​And some people say use less stuff.  So long as it makes you happy, it is not totally use less to at least one person. And that goes for your words and my admiration for VU Meters.
 
ORT

 

[jchabalk]

If you use a Mac with a display to play your music and you want VU meters you could check out Spectre.
 
And if you have a Schiit DAC connected to your computer you've solved your problem 
 

 

 

[Jason Stoddard]

 
That right there is some drool worthy Schiit. When Jason gets these just exactly perfect, all heaven will break loose.

Things are looking good!
 
The clips are working as intended--as in, they are holding all the critical devices onto the heatsinks (outputs, driver, VAS) and the big heatsinks are keeping things nice and isothermal. Vidar now sails through the 1 hour, 1/3 power test with heatsinks holding at 57 degrees C--far, far from the thermal cutoff at 85C. The previous version hit the thermal cutoff within 15 minutes. Oops. 
 
This means that we now have some more leeway on bias, so the production Vidars won't have to run as lean as the prototypes. That's usually good news for sonics (within reason--until we have a true constant-transconductance output stage.) 
 
The clips need a couple of small tweaks, but that shouldn't affect schedule. Now, I just need to make some small changes to the board (all fit related, except for a relay with a reversed coil on the input--necessary to mute the input on power-up so the microprocessor can do all of its adjustments), approve the first article heatsinks that will here in about a week (which were revised to fit the clips, and will be revised once again to move the clip mounting point), make sure they fit the first article chassis, release (or tweak and release) the first article chassis, and we're in the end game.
 
And now you know a little bit more about "it's done when it's done." Lots of custom parts (chassis, clips, heatsinks, transformer, PCB) means lots of moving targets, which may also be interrelated. So a change in one can end up affecting many things. The upside of this is that Vidar will work better, assemble more efficiently, and be more easily serviceable if there is a problem. Consider this: a complete Vidar teardown (from assembled amp to bare PCB that has outputs hanging out in free air) takes only about a minute with the new clips. 

 

[Pandahead]

Great news on Vidar. Get a Freya, the right speakers for you, plus two Vidars, Yggy or Gumby of course and collect some good tubes to roll and you will forget about MQA!
 
 
Meters were done to death a few months back but I confess to fond memories of my SAE power amp back in the 70's. When they went to led it wasn't the same. Don't drive your speakers into distortion!

 
The Transporter has nice digital ones, and confess it's fun to see them bounce to musical peaks though functionally irrelevant. They sure were handy on my  Nakamichi tape decks....
 
 

 

[DigitalFrontEnd]

Without a doubt, if I was starting from scratch, I would buy a Freya and Vidar combo, plus a Mani/Rega set up for vinyl.  Digital source would be a Sonore microRendu or
similar and a DAC. Speakers would more than likely be the Spatial Audio M3. 
 
I would not spend a penny more. Period. High end audio is a terrible investment and the press has brainwashed many to chase ridiculous price to performance parameters. 
 
It is my experience, almost without deviation, that those with the most expensive and complicated systems get bored the quickest, are the most musically incurious an
and uninformed, and have the least impressive collections.

 

[bmanone]

I put the meters in my player...my amp (Yamaha B-2x) has none:

 

[Vigrith]

Given the nature of this thread and how wide the subjects approached can be I figure it may be the better place for me to ask a couple questions.
 
Basically the deal is the only real speakers I've ever owned are a pair of Devialet Phantoms coming up on like 3 years now which are integrated, I have next to no knowledge of anything speaker related and until recently I'd not even considered anything else because the vast majority of my listening is done through headphones. However, given I now own 2 Jotunheim amps (office and home) and a Mjolnir 2 I have yet to even figure out what their pre-outs really do, I figured it'd be about time I look into speaker stuff.
 
I ended up looking at Freya which is extremely (fittingly) attractive aesthetically speaking; my intent with it would be creating a decently sized system as I already have a bunch of headphone amplifiers I'd just look into getting some sort of paired bookshelf powered Audioengine A5+esque monitors along with the Freya and potentially a Vidar and passives later on.
 
As I understand it I can connect something as small as a Mimby into one of the 3 SE inputs available (and/or a Gumby later on through XLR) to feed everything else - I could then connect all 3 outs to an assortment of things; XLR to MJ2 or Jotunheim, 1st SE to speakers, 2nd SE to another headamp for example and just control everything through Freya, correct?

 

[OldRoadToad]

  I put the meters in my player...my amp (Yamaha B-2x) has none:

​That is kinda sorta cool!  Not my (yet!) cup o' tea but then there are enough types of tea to keep all most any one happy.  Well done and thank you!
 
ORT

 

[Thouston]

Thank you for the update, Jason.
When Vidar is ready, I am going to buy two of them, to go with the rest of my Schiit.

 

[DigitalFrontEnd]

  Thank you for the update, Jason.
When Vidar is ready, I am going to buy two of them, to go with the rest of my Schiit.

You and just about everybody else here!
 
With the Vidar, I will own 4 pieces of Schiit.