[Bonehead7171]

Curious to know what speakers you are using the Vidars with.

Vandersteen 2CE Signature

 

[scotdouglas]

Announcing .... the Schiit Freya Einvigi.

An 8-tube 6SN7 amplifier like nothing ever seen before. (*)

Like the Freya+, you can switch between passive, differential buffer, or differential tube gain stages.

So what's an Einvigi?
From The Vikings of Bjornstad Old Norse Dictionary, Einvigi, is a duel, single combat.

The Einvigi is two Freyas in a box, designed to allow instantaneous switching between any two pairs (or combos) of tubes (or non-tubes.)

Let's imagine you had for the gain (right side) tubes
* 2 matched KenRad VT-231
* 2 matched Melz 1578
And for the (left side) followers
* 2 matched Raytheon 6SN7WGT
* 2 matched Sylvania 6SN7W

You could compare ... again, with no delay, just by flipping switches:

Combos:
* KenRad + Raytheon vs Melz + Sylvania
or
* KenRad + Sylvania vs Melz + Raytheon
or
* KenRad + Sylvania vs Melz + diff-buffer
etc

Hold gain side constant:
* Melz + any two of [Raytheon or Sylvania or diff-buffer or passive]
or
* KenRad + any two of [Raytheon or Sylvania or diff-buffer or passive]

Hold follower side constant:
* Raytheon + (KenRad or Melz)
or
* Sylvania + (KenRad or Melz).

Of course, by moving the tubes, you can also try various combos with Sylvanias and Raytheon as drivers, and/or the Melz and KenRads as followers. You may find you like combos that go against conventional wisdom.

WOW ?? Yes, very neat.


But WAIT .... there's MORE!

There's firmware support for automated blind testing!

Pick your "A" combo, and pick your "B" combo .... which can be any of the combos listed above.

Switches let you pick:
* how many iterations you want (5/10/20/30)
* how long each sample plays (5/10/20/40/80/160/320 sec)
* whether your source is "live" or supplied or whether you feed your DAC a sample stored on the Einvigi
* test pattern: AB paired, AB random, or XAB (**)

Say you pick: 10 iterations, 30 seconds, AB random, and you'd copied a 24-96 FLAC of Yo Yo Ma Plays Ennio Morricone as your listening choice for string music. (A nice choice, but Ennio Morricone playing Ennio Morricone on the soundtrack of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly would also be an excellent choice.)

Hit the CALIBRATE button: Freya Einvigi does an internal sound level calibration to match within 0.05 db.

Hit the GO botton: Display shows "1", and beautiful sounds flow into your ears. After the designated 30 seconds, there's a 2-second gap. On a copy of the Data Form that ships with the product, you write down whether you thought sample 1 was "A combo" or "B combo", and sample 2 starts up.

After listening to all the samples ... 10 iterations x 2 per iteration for an AB x 30 seconds ... so approximately 10 minutes later in this hypothetical example ... you hit the SHOW SEQ button, and Einvigi's minimalist display steps through the random pattern .... 1 was A, 2 was B, 3 was A, 4 was A, 5 was A, 6 was B, etc. You score yourself ... 13 of 20 correct. A handy-dandy table printed on the Data Form tells you that the probability of getting that result randomly is 13.2%. The frequentist interpretation would be that you have not convincingly demonstrated that you can consistently differentiate between what's in Combo A vs Combo B. Whether that's good or not depends on what you were expecting. If the Melz sounded to you like the differential buffer ... hmmm ... let's just say you have ears and/or listening skills that allow you to be a very thrifty audiophile. (This could be me, I don't know, I don't have an Einvigi to help me.)


But WAIT ... there's MORE!

Instead of having a Thunderdome trial of your tubes, you can also AB-Test two different sources ... like 2 different DACS. The Einvigi will send the same stored sample to 2 DACS, and randomly switch between them. (Or you can feed your own source to both.)


But WAIT ... there's MORE!

Most of us don't spend most of our time doing rigorous AB-testing. And don't want to.

Freya Einvigi allows you to switch between two different sets of favorite tubes, without the hassle of pulling hot tubes and putting the other set in.

You like KenRads with some music and NOS TungSols with some other kinds of music, but sometimes it's too much hassle to change? Or you're lucky/clever enough to have some Melz 1578s, but you only use those for very serious listening time? Einvigi is your answer, lazy guy or gal.


Other details:
* In test mode with tubes, all the tubes in play are heated, allowing instantaneously switching.
* but in "normal" operation, you only heat the tubes that are in use.
* internal storage of a sample is necessary ... or at least very helpful ... in allowing you to replay the same tune over and over and over. Per my understanding, that would be Best Practice for AB-testing.
* Einvigi stores several 10,000-long strings of (pseudo) random numbers. One for paired AB, one or more for the longer "random but balanced" sequences.


It this some crazy Schiit? Yes it is.

Do you want it? Yes you do.


-------
(*) Not an actual Schiit product announcement. Purely speculative.

(**) I'm not well-studied on AB-testing. I'm using these terms here, which may not be "industry standard":
AB paired: for each pair of tests, the sequence is either AB or BA.
AB random: for say 10 iterations - in total there will be 10xA and 10xB, but they won't necessarily be paired.
XAB: plays A or B as the reference first, then random A/B and random A/B, you have to decide which matches the reference.

Only if all of the switches are on the back.

 

[US Blues]

Vandersteen 2CE Signature

I had a pair of 2C's years ago, and I run mono Vidar's in my system currently. I can appreciate how the Vandy's love the power that twin Vidar's provide.

And since you've never had a dedicated DAC before the real fun will start when you get your new Bifrost 2/64 tomorrow. I look forward to reading your impressions. Congrats on the upgrades!

 

[bevanc]

Vandersteen 2CE Signature

Nice, I have a friend who has some 2's I think, but his main speakers are the Vandersteen Quattro's. They sound amazing

 

[Pondoro]

Here's the thing: It's not just about whether it's worth doing or the amount of work it takes to get firmware just right. Software that relies on screens to be used ages about as well as cheese on a hot summer's day.
Just look at the infotainment screens of any car that's older than just a few years, or any other device that has an UI that hasn't been updated in a hot minute.

Adding screens to your Schiit might sound fun and interesting in theory, but you're artificially aging your gear if you were to actually do so. Everything that Schiit has made in the past 12 years will still look just as great 12, 24, even 48 years from now. (And with a few new caps, it'll probably still sound just as good, too.) Add a screen to it, and you'll be sick of looking at it (and probably of using it, depending on how well the overall UX ages) sooner than you might expect.

Part of what I appreciate about Schiit is that they design their gear to be simple to use and to look timeless. The day Jason decides to slap a (touch) screen on something for any reason other than absolute necessity (i.e. URD) will be the day I start looking for a new manufacturer for my audio stuff.

And this is coming from a software engineer and UI/UX designer with two decades of experience under his belt.

Better than a graphical user interface would be punched cards. Especially for Loki - you could have several decks for various settings. Read your deck in and then watch the knobs rotate to the correct positions! Punched card look and feel has not changed in decades.

 

[DennisLL]

I had a pair of 2C's years ago, and I run mono Vidar's in my system currently. I can appreciate how the Vandy's love the power that twin Vidar's provide.

And since you've never had a dedicated DAC before the real fun will start when you get your new Bifrost 2/64 tomorrow. I look forward to reading your impressions. Congrats on the upgrades!

I'm using 2 Aegirs with Vandersteen 2CE Signature III's. Really enjoying the them.

 

[FLTWS]

Vandersteen 2CE Signature

That 2C line was always great sound for the buck.

 

[dstrimbu]

It's funny because it's true…

So very, very true. Finally got the speakers in the right locations, reworked my room treatments and re-arranged the racking of my components to enable shortest electrical paths for all components. The system sounds better than it ever has, and as a consequence... the "unlistenable list" has grown dramatically.

But boy, oh boy - when the recording is good, the results often invoke goosebumps...

 

[33na3rd]

I'm using 2 Aegirs with Vandersteen 2CE Signature III's. Really enjoying the them.

Do you find that the 2 Aegirs have enough power for your needs?

My loudspeakers have similar sensitivity to yours.
I would love to have a pair of Tyrs, but a pair of Aegirs might be more practical and easier to handle (financially and physically).

 

[ArmchairPhilosopher]

So very, very true. Finally got the speakers in the right locations, reworked my room treatments and re-arranged the racking of my components to enable shortest electrical paths for all components. The system sounds better than it ever has, and as a consequence... the "unlistenable list" has grown dramatically.

But boy, oh boy - when the recording is good, the results often invoke goosebumps...

Here's a whacky idea for Jason and Mike:
As a spiritual sibling to the Buy Better Gear light, I'd really like to have a Your Gear's Too Damned F#@&ing Good button. Once pressed, the DAC toggles into Schiitty Source Mode that magically filters out all the crap and makes your bad recordings somewhat enjoyable again. Should be easy enough, right?!? I'm sure Mike can figure something out.

Edit:
Come to think of it… Integrating a cheap DS DAC chip with the most basic output filter in parallel to the analog boards, and have a button to toggle between the two circuits, might actually do the trick. That way you'd have a "critical listening" mode for your high quality sources, and a "god, I really don't care" mode for those times you really feel like listening to The Pretty Reckless or Black Stone Cherry but are in no mood to endure the relentless barrage of pins and needles and compression artifacts that those recordings force on you when listened to through highly resolving DACs like Gumby or Yggy.
Sure, you could easily accomplish the same thing by getting a cheap DAC and switch between the two, but integrated into Gumby or Yggy, you'd have the same benefit without the hassle of having to deal with the additional cables, switches, and boxes.

Disclaimer:
I'm (obviously, I hope) kidding.
…somewhat…

 

[Roy G. Biv]

You could always convert all your files to low bitrate MP3s and save Mike the hassle

 

[ArmchairPhilosopher]

You could always convert all your files to low bitrate MP3s and save Mike the hassle

Sure, but that wouldn't work for streaming, though.

 

[corndog71]

I thought Loki was the fix for bad recordings.

 

[belgiangenius]

I thought Loki was the fix for bad recordings.

Impossible.

You can't fix the destruction of dynamic range compression with an equalizer. Music that sounds congested, bloated, and lacks treble and detail is simply ruined.

There are CDs that I purchased having high hopes for that I simply dropped in the trash can after one listen.

 

[Odin412]

I thought Loki was the fix for bad recordings.

I sometimes use the 6 kHz knob on the Lokius as a sibilance control.