[CarlosAudio51]

Anybody know of any alternative to Saga S?

Kind of a philosophical question because I just ordered a Saga S but I am surprised I couldn't find any viable alternative to it, at a similar price. About the only comparative pre-amp I could find was the Emotiva PT-1 but I really didn't need all the features it had and I was more drawn to the Saga S simplicity and relay switched attenuator for volume control.

Is the market for remote controlled single-ended pre-amps that small?

PS: Didn't want to delay much with buying the Saga S since I believe Jason said this was just a limited run to get rid of old metal case parts. As opposed to the Freya S, don't think there's official word on whether the Saga S is staying for good.

 

[EricDH]

Last night Roon Radio played a track that is seriously breaking my brain.
The soundstage moved so far back towards the listening position and left/right that I thought that I had surround sound. I don't.
Anyone want to tell me what's going on here? Start with the title track.

https://open.qobuz.com/album/sa4w4gax36vib

For those without Qobuz the album is-

As @ArmchairPhilosopher explained, it must be phase shift. One of the more extreme methods is Q-sound, used for example by Roger Waters on the album Amused to Death. On this album, sounds seem to come from left and right, and sometimes even from behind.

 

[Timster]

Maybe weights and measures should be added to the sine wave?

Maybe ... let's see how much discussion ensues

 

[Timster]

O

No aeroplanes yet. I'll have to a) step up my game and 2) recruit more allies........

oooh. I'll talk planes

 

[Timster]

My best guess would be some form of phase shift between the left and right channels. A very slight phase shift can create the impression of a wider stage. A continuous moving in and out of phase might be causing the impression that the stage is moving left and right. I have no idea how they recorded and/or mastered this album, but I could imagine that they used a separate tape per channel, and that each reel was driven by its own motor. That might cause slight differences in tape speed between the channels, leading to slowly fluctuating phase shifts.

But again, this is just my best guess.

There's a remix of a track by The Glitch Mob where a phase shift was used on purpose to create a similar effect of "fake surround":
Artist: The Glitch Mob
Album: See Without Eyes (Deluxe)
Track: Disintegrate Slowly (1788-L remix)

The first 1:05 of this track sound completely normal, but when the "remix part" kicks in, it all of a sudden blows the side walls of your room away.
Please note that this effect isn't nearly as pronounced with headphones, and that the original version of this track doesn't have this, only the 1788-L remix does.

I'm totally fascinated by this phase shift surround sound effect, and this remix is the most extreme example I have found to date.

Some people theorize that this might be the same reason why some tubes create a wider sound stage than others do, and they do so especially when compared to solid-state. Apparently, slight physical differences between one tube to another can cause one of them to introduce a very slight delay into its channel, leading to a slight shift in phase between the two channels, just enough to widen the sound stage a tiny bit.

Here's a couple of good examples of the effect I know of.
Madonna's Immaculate Collection - Express Yourself, Vogue
Deep Forest - Hunting

Done well it is very effective.

 

[Derrick Swart]

As @ArmchairPhilosopher explained, it must be phase shift. One of the more extreme methods is Q-sound, used for example by Roger Waters on the album Amused to Death. On this album, sounds seem to come from left and right, and sometimes even from behind.

Yep the famous dog barking! Great album and recording.

 

[FLTWS]

O

oooh. I'll talk planes

My flight deck.

 

[ArmchairPhilosopher]

My flight deck.

Your airplane has a landline? That seems impractical…

 

[ArmchairPhilosopher]

Anybody know of any alternative to Saga S?

Kind of a philosophical question because I just ordered a Saga S but I am surprised I couldn't find any viable alternative to it, at a similar price. About the only comparative pre-amp I could find was the Emotiva PT-1 but I really didn't need all the features it had and I was more drawn to the Saga S simplicity and relay switched attenuator for volume control.

Is the market for remote controlled single-ended pre-amps that small?

PS: Didn't want to delay much with buying the Saga S since I believe Jason said this was just a limited run to get rid of old metal case parts. As opposed to the Freya S, don't think there's official word on whether the Saga S is staying for good.

Question: Is there an alternative to Schiit 'Product X'?
Answer: For the same money? No. For twice or more of what 'Product X' would cost? Maybe.

I don't mean this in a flippant way, but that's usually how it goes with the schtuff that Schiit makes.

 

[dieslemat]

My flight deck.

What is that chair on the right?

 

[tafens]

Wish I still had my Commodore 64. Had a game I liked on 5 1/4 disk. Took 45 minutes to load. Aaagh. The good old days. Even had a 300 baud modem to go on message boards.

I still have mine, but it’s the newer “slim” model C64C.

I actually got it out of storage a couple of years ago and programmed a small two-player game with the built-in BASIC. It was a quite fun and refreshing experience, not nearly as much to worry about as nowadays, however there is the somewhat major one of.. speed. The music you can get out of it is awesome, tho

 

[Pondoro]

Anybody know of any alternative to Saga S?

Kind of a philosophical question because I just ordered a Saga S but I am surprised I couldn't find any viable alternative to it, at a similar price. About the only comparative pre-amp I could find was the Emotiva PT-1 but I really didn't need all the features it had and I was more drawn to the Saga S simplicity and relay switched attenuator for volume control.

Is the market for remote controlled single-ended pre-amps that small?

PS: Didn't want to delay much with buying the Saga S since I believe Jason said this was just a limited run to get rid of old metal case parts. As opposed to the Freya S, don't think there's official word on whether the Saga S is staying for good.

In his Blog Jason basically says there is nothing like Freya in the price range, and the tubed version of Freya is like 3x Saga S. So yeah, nothing like it. I just bought the Saga + and love it, I paid extra for that glowing glass. Freya was a bridge too far, since I do not plan or need a balanced system. The competitor of Saga S is Freya S, the competitor of Saga + is Freya +.

 

[FLTWS]

What is that chair on the right?

A very old used $50.00 office chair with vinyl covering that is cracking and one broken caster. Scheduled for replacement.

The two PC's are linked , had a buddy that would fly with me. He passed away a while back so I go solo going forward. He was the compu-tent one of the two of us and took care of all the maintenance on the boxes. The box on the right (2011 vintage Win 7) is dying, going to trash it Feb or March replace it with the left box (2013 vintage Win 7) retrofitted with Win 11 and it will become my do everything but simming box. I'll store the peripherals in their original boxes for back up. A new PC with SOTA specs will be replacing the white one for simming only with FS2020 and perhaps a 4K monitor to replace the 1080 one. I'll be doing a lot more simming this year with knee replacement surgery scheduled for April on the L knee and if I'm ready, the R knee in October.

By the way, the chair on the left is the interesting one!

 

[FLTWS]

Your airplane has a landline? That seems impractical…

?

 

[CarlosAudio51]

Question: Is there an alternative to Schiit 'Product X'?
Answer: For the same money? No. For twice or more of what 'Product X' would cost? Maybe.

I don't mean this in a flippant way, but that's usually how it goes with the schtuff that Schiit makes.

Yeah, fair enough.

In his Blog Jason basically says there is nothing like Freya in the price range, and the tubed version of Freya is like 3x Saga S. So yeah, nothing like it. I just bought the Saga + and love it, I paid extra for that glowing glass. Freya was a bridge too far, since I do not plan or need a balanced system. The competitor of Saga S is Freya S, the competitor of Saga + is Freya +.

Yeah, makes sense. Freya S was tantalizing but I have no balanced sources so couldn't justify the extra $300 over Saga S. Didn't want to get Saga+ because it would go on the living room. Not a good idea to put a glowing tube with kids around. Haha.