Ok, after a week of busy shipping and trying to get stuff back to people, Here are some impressions.
Sorry about the noisy front room. I was trying to direct people to the back where the food and garden was, but folks seemed to want to hang out in the front and chat despite the lure of boneless wings and pizza. Oh well. Seems like most folks had a good time, and it was wonderful chatting with everyone, although it was a trick managing so many attendees between just a few organizers.
I really enjoyed meeting all of you (or seeing familiar faces).
A few people asked, so here's the gear from the two channel room:
Speakers: Wharfedale Jade 3's. from Music Direct (great guys, lots of good sales if you stop by their showroom or website!)
Preamp: Schiit Freya
Amp: Schiit Vidar
DAC: Yggdrasil, Multibit Bifrost, at one point a chi-fi r2r DAC and a soundblaster.
Cables: Audioquest Columbia (also on sale from music direct! Super great cables) Audioquest speaker cable from the early 2000's (can't remember name)
If you're interested in two-channel stuff but don't know much, let me know! I'm a big two-channel geek, so I'm always happy to chat about it. I know keith and a few other folks are into two-channel as well.
Here's a few pics:
Sound impressions!
I was lucky to get to play with the gear for the weeks preceding the meet, and also to get to do some listening both before, after, and during some of the slower parts of the meet.
The Gungnir/Mimby combo is really nice, does a lot of different music well, drives pretty much every headphone. It's been around for an eternity in head-fi time but it still just sounds really nice.
I think the Jotunheim is my new favorite schiit headamp though. Buttery smooth, very linear, lightning fast and extraordinarily punchy. A great value at the price. I'd use it for my mixing/mastering work, it's neutral and dynamic enough. Single-ended and balanced out are both great. Even the Beyer headphones and unmodded HD800's sounded as well-behaved as ever in the treble on this amp.
The Utopias sounded quite nice as well. Paired very well with Valhalla. Quite dynamic, but they have some dips that make them seem a little disconnected between the mids, bass, and treble. Otherwise fairly decently balanced. Not my favorite, but a really enjoyable headphone nonetheless.
The Beyerdynamic D1990 was a big surprise for me. I enjoy beyerdynamic headphones while realizing they aren't anywhere close to neutral. This one was much better behaved in the treble than I'm used to, though it still had a distinctively 'beyer' sound. What I was really surprised by though was the punch. These cans were a lot faster, tighter and punchier than I'm used to with Beyers. I can see people looking for a lively headphone enjoying these. They even sounded pretty good out of the Jotunheim.
ZMF Auteur.
I got the chance to hear a prototype of this headpone a month or two ago at Zach's house.and it sounded really excellent. Very linear, the most neutral of any of his headphones, but still a touch warm. IMO pretty difficult and demanding headphones to drive (I don't care for OTL tube amps on heaphones) but out of the right amp they really sing. Its not often I hear anything as dynamic, lively or as naturally detailed as these, and when you do there's usually frequency response tradeoffs (a la Utopia). These kinda had it all. If I had my druthers I'd like an even more neutral sound, but of course Zach can always do a little custom tweaking. I suspect that at the price point these are going to be very popular. There really isn't anything that can compete with how coherent and all-around enjoyable these are.
Abyss out of the Milo was pretty phenomenal. Very different presentation than most headphones, but detail retrieval and dynamics were stellar. Kinda finicky though, and expensive to the point of not being that interesting for me, even if I did have the money to afford them.
Audeze LCD series headphones sounded better than I remember. Fazors and other upgrades? I heard less veiled, darkness, and more smooth punchiness. Nice, Audeze.
Popped my head into the two-channel room only a few times. The room was large and a bit diffuse, but tonality and soundstage was wide and pleasantly warm. Yggy sounds phenomenal. Can't comment outside of that on this room.
However, I did get the chance to more seriously audition the Freya, Vidar, Gumby combo. The Freya schiit sent came with a very nice anodized steel or aluminum remote. Not sure if this is for sale soon or just a custom one-off show remote for increased durability (it's different than the one pictured in the manual) but people would pay good money for it. You've been put on notice Jason. (I know, it's just a remote, shoot me.)
In terms of Transparency I think the Saga has an edge on the Freya - transients are cleaner and sharper on Saga, as one would expect from the simple stage. The Freya has a softer transient sound, and while I found the JFET buffer and passive modes difficult to tell apart, the Tube stage was very lively and nice. I noticed most people preferred this one. Overall a killer, feature-packed preamp for the price.
Vidar is where the real goods start though. The Vidar + Saga combo was unbelievably transparent. Vidar is TIGHT. Bass was tight (right on down through the 20-30hz range) midrange and treble were tight, everything was just lively, transparent and bursting with energy. A very vivid and energetic listen. Not fatiguing though, and pulled off a neat trick with relaxing music and detail/depth/precision of soundstage. Probably the stupid value schiit offers. There's nothing else in the price range that comes close to comparing, even in the used market (in my experience, and I have soem VERY nice amps at home that I compared it to... all of which cost significantly more than the vidar)
If I were Jason, I'd be looking to do more with that Pivot point tech... and I'd be looking to put some microprocessors into pivot point headamp. In any case, the new gear knocks it out of the park for me. It's' for sure on my list of new mixing/mastering gear wants. It's that good.
Big thanks again to everyone who came. Looking forward to doing it again soon, and a possible november meet!
... My only feedback on the event would be that it'd be nice to have a designated listening room/area where it's quiet. Personally I can't really listen past background noise very well and I can't tolerate high SPL very well either (tinnitus and my ears just don't seem to work right above 95dBA or so), I imagine some others are in the same boat.
) and the other individuals who brought setups to share audio nirvana with all.
