I’ve got my compass in this afternoon and here am I, posting the pictures and first impressions.
When I first handled the package, it felt pretty heavy, so that was a good start. Next thing I noticed was that my package was pretty much undamaged, it was a little bit dirty, but undamaged.
Here we have it on the kitchentable:
The declared value was 54 USD, it still cost me 38 Euros in tax. Thank you government……..
So I started unpacking. Pretty hard task, since literally everything had been taped up. So after some struggling I got it open and it looked like this:
Good clearance between the Compass and the box, no dents in the cardboard on the inside.
And then I had to flip the compass upside-down, where the cables where taped up against its belly:
After getting rid of the bubble wrap I noticed something strange, in the middle of the lid, the paint was much deeper black than on de sides, was this also in the prototype versions?
And then we have here the final pictures, I really dig the gold plated connections on the back, truly a piece of art.
And then it was time to pump some sound trough it, I hooked it up to my computer. But when I tried the optical link, I couldn’t get any sound trough it, same applies for Coax… I will have to give that an another look. So I opted for USB, the driver where installed automatically by Vista. So I started up ITunes and started to listen.
All my listening has been pretty random so far, so there is no system is it..
I used Sennheiser HD 595's
AC/DC, Hells Bells – Earth in Bright mode.
Didn’t sound too shabby, the base was very pushed back, but is was vey controlled, I really think it needs at least 100 hours of burn-in before it starts to open up. A very promising start for what is to come.
Red Hot Chili Peppers, Dani California - Earth in Bright mode.
Sounded again very promising, but I still have that feeling that it could do so much better. The bas is still in the back ground, but the guitar solo at the end does sounds very alive. Yet again I feel that it needs more burn-in.
Red Hot Chili Peppers, Dani California - Earth in Normal mode.
Much better than bright mode, the bass is more there, this is something I like!
Motörhead ,When The Eagle Screams – Moon in Bright mode.
The music suddenly feels more separated, you can distinguish the base of this song a lot better than with onboard audio. Also Lemmy’s voice sound much more raw and vibrating. Much more Motörheadish
This are my first impressions hope you enjoyed them, I shall post in the future some more about my findings.