Well I'm one of the older guys on Head-Fi, grew up with vinyl. Never did have the money for the exotic brands but I remember I really got into the early Dual 505 turntable, Goldring cartridges, and a bit later Musical Fidelity amps in the 80's. I got big time OCD over little T-Amps back in their day. I'm definitely an old analogue-man, lover of World Music and almost everything else musically. In July of 2019 I bought the
Little Bear 4-X hybrid tube amp and have used it on and off ever since. Lately I found the Little Bear a good match with the Shuoer S12 Planar IEM and got back into using it.
A few weeks ago I got a message from Burson Audio asking me if I would like to compare the Burson V5i-D-2 opamp with the stock opamps. I've never been a compulsive Modder, but when necessary I'm up for it. The Little Bear looked simple enough so I found the idea interesting. I had no idea of any difference a new opamp would make to the sound, I'd never changed one before on the Little Bear. So armed with some small Allen Keys, some tweezers and a shaky hand, I got going. It turned out so simple to take the board out, take out the stock opamps and put the more substantial Burson's on.
The opamps had arrived a while ago, so I started to deliberately use the Little Bear 4-X most of the time to get back familiarity with the sound. That meant constant charging because the built in battery does not have the longest play time (about 5 hours). I chose a few songs to really mainly concentrate on... 'Stimela', live,
Hugh Masekela and 'Shovelheads',
Shriekback (Yep a bit left-of, but has a lot going on), and the great 'Grandpa's Interview',
Neil Young. From
Patti Smith, 'We Three', and also some
New Model Army tracks.
When comparing and A/B-ing IEMs there is a simplicity to hear the differences. Generally just take one off and put the other on. It takes just a few seconds. Even then there has to be the memory of the previous moments. The moments are close enough to get a fair idea of the differences. When changing opamps there is more time involved in the change so the gap in listening is longer, so possibly more deceptive. It's useful to write keywords down to keep impressions fresh. So what I write here can be taken with a pinch of subjective salt.
Before listening I left the 4-X to warm up for 15mins. First thing I noticed with the Burson, seemingly more RF interference. More sensitive obviously, but that can be good in the long run. Not a problem for me, but maybe for some. For me once the music starts this old guy cannot hear the RF so no problem.
Compared to stock the Burson's are less generally fuzzy, and have a much cleaner sound. Leading edges of guitars and drums are more defined and precise, sub-bass is cleaner without losing rumble. A subjective feeling of musicality arises whilst listening with the Burson V5i-D-2's.
Patti Smith's wonderful voice becomes richer, thicker and smoother, yet cleaner in 'We Three'. Same with
Hugh Masekela's voice in 'Stimela' and the instruments too. On 'Grandpa's Interview' from the 'Greendale' project,
Neil Young has more resonance on the lower register guitar strings, and a kind of mini vibrato all the way through plus great cymbal crashes later in the track.
There is little doubt the Burson opamps are noticeably different in sound to the OG's. It surprised me that a little opamp can make such a difference. The Burson's are here to stay in my Little Bear and easily give me a large dose of extra enjoyment. I'm not totally clear much they cost because price seems to vary, but from Burson direct I think they are about $59 but they double the enjoyment factors.
IEM used,
IMR Splash of Gold open back,
Spiral Dot L tips. Sony Xperia 5ii phone.
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