[Xenophon]

No need to get personal or belligerent....it's just an amp and everyone is entitled to his opinion.  What's smooth to you might sound muddled to me.  Matter of fact, despite it having a couple of crippling defects, one of the things I like about the Burson amps vs the V200 is their speed and crispness.  Preferring one amp over another does not a fool make....

 

[alvinmate]

  No need to get personal or belligerent....it's just an amp and everyone is entitled to his opinion.  What's smooth to you might sound muddled to me.  Matter of fact, despite it having a couple of crippling defects, one of the things I like about the Burson amps vs the V200 is their speed and crispness.  Preferring one amp over another does not a fool make....

I agree with above comments... no need to bash or criticize any particular product or brand.... At this level it becomes a personal preference and everyone has their own opinion.........Just relax and enjoy the music....

 
                                                              Happy holidays to everyone

 

 

[Megalomaniak]

Im not going personal or anything like that. Someone prefer A amp, others prefer B amp, thats legit.
 
Whats not legit is the perceptions this guy got from the V281, they dont meet anyones ones. You might like or not the the amp, but saying that it has hard trebble and it doesnt reach bottom bass is nonsense. Just that. It should be problem of the DAC, cuz im running it with a 250€ Musical Fidelity V-DAC II (DSD1792) and a PCM1792A DAC, the Xonar Essence STX. And those DACs extract a lot of detail with no harsh at all and a top level amount of deep bass.
 
Even my iPhone 4S as DAC offers a hell of a lot of deep bass.
 
Its like saying that the HD800 is not analytical. Thats not true.

 

[Tony1110]

I hear it mostly with the hd800 (and also a bit when I demoed a modded HE6, I would expect an unmodded HE6 to show more of this). The v200 and to a lesser extent the Rag, both impart a 'laid back' sense to my hd800 treble, but the 281 seems to bring it up front which is somewhat annoying to my ear. Can't explain it. *shrug

I think it was Roskodan who said that the treble can be altered by means of the jumpers inside the amp. If you're hearing tizzyness or glare you might want to give that a shot. Did Purrin hear your amp?

 

[xaval]

System matching.
 
As said before, the Vio is very true to the source. I hear no lack of bottom end on any of my DACs. I hear no stridency or tizzyness or glare on top end either with the internal Vio DAC or with the Bushmaster. I hear a bit of that glare and sibilance with the Audiolab because it's what this DAC can do under some circumstances and despite that, I love it for what it can do with my speakers and speaker amp.
 
It's also about relative impressions.
 
I have no experience with the Rag and I'll admit that listening to both the Rag and Vio under the same DAC (and headphone) to some it may come as the Rag being smoother on top and deeper down there. Purrin is one of the most prolific impressions poster with amps and DACs. He's also very consistent with his impressions and you can easily tell what he likes and dislikes after a couple dozen posts.
 
As always, imo we're nitpicking with comparisons. And nitpicking is what HF is all about. This new Vio amp is a serious contender and that's a fact for me.

 

[Viper2005]

I think it was Roskodan who said that the treble can be altered by means of the jumpers inside the amp. If you're hearing tizzyness or glare you might want to give that a shot. Did Purrin hear your amp?

 
No it wasn't mine, but his observations about the treble seem to jive with my own experience.   
Although I do think both the Rag and V281 have comparable deep bass kick, I'm not sure I have any material that goes super low to test the lowest octaves.
I haven't tried opening up the amp yet, I might give it a try!

 

[silver333]

... try with Rockna Wavedream Platinum balanced, I would say that is fantastic

 

[Tony1110]

System matching.

As said before, the Vio is very true to the source. I hear no lack of bottom end on any of my DACs. I hear no stridency or tizzyness or glare on top end either with the internal Vio DAC or with the Bushmaster. I hear a bit of that glare and sibilance with the Audiolab because it's what this DAC can do under some circumstances and despite that, I love it for what it can do with my speakers and speaker amp.

It's also about relative impressions.

I have no experience with the Rag and I'll admit that listening to both the Rag and Vio under the same DAC (and headphone) to some it may come as the Rag being smoother on top and deeper down there. Purrin is one of the most prolific impressions poster with amps and DACs. He's also very consistent with his impressions and you can easily tell what he likes and dislikes after a couple dozen posts.

As always, imo we're nitpicking with comparisons. And nitpicking is what HF is all about. This new Vio amp is a serious contender and that's a fact for me.

That's right. I've heard profound changes each time I've switched source. The fact that the amplifier gets out of the way without imposing much of its own character is a good thing as far as I'm concerned. I feel like I'm hearing what my DAC can do in a pure, untarnished kind of way. I suppose it could be a double-edged sword for fussier headphones: you have the advantage of only having to choose the appropriate source but you don't get the sugar coating that a lot of amps offer. Personal preference as to which way you want to do it, I suppose.

But there is definitely no tizz or glare inherent to the V281's sound.

 

[saxelrod92]

Yea I've had the V281 for a few months now, and it's basically neutral with a slight liquid overall tone to it. There was never any burn in, or change to the sound in all these months, and it handled every headphone perfectly. Even without being able to try different dacs I still feel like I'm listening to the dac rather than the amp, pretty cool how it does that. Also no glare or anything like that, unless the song/sound files had it in them/the headphones are prone to it. I think in general the V281 just reminds me of sound is heard naturally, like the way it would sound to you if you heard it live, but not like a concert, like if you were in a room where musicians were playing (Ignoring soundstage). Meaning it sounds the way your ears would interpret it if you weren't listening to a recording, whether its electric guitar through an amp, or acoustic drums, or even EDM before it gets mastered and compressed, music and audio in general don't really sound warm or analytical or neutral in real life, it sounds like whatever the instrument or source of the sound makes it sound like, but our ears will tend to hear it with a high degree of detail, and slight liquid/organic tone, regardless of the instrument. So for an amp to be able to get out of the way like this, is something I really value highly, because I play drums and have played in heavy bands, and a lot of the time I find that amps and headphones and dacs just don't do a great job or recreating what those sounds really sound like if you were in the room they were being made.

Most audio reproduction gear will make it sound warm, neutral, or bright, and everything in between. but those aren't very good ways to recreate sound, instead those do make for great ways to please someone who wants to hear sound in a certain way, which is fine, dont get me wrong, but I'm just saying the V281 is recreating sounds, in my opinion, the most proper way sound should be recreated. It's hard for me to find good descriptive words to explain this, because its not really neutral, or organic, or liquid, or whatever, it just....correct, to what I'm familiar with in real instruments or music creation sources.
 
I also experience a similar thing with the Alpha Primes going balanced through the V281.
 
And I'm just using a schiit bifrost uber as the dac to achieve all this.

 

[Tony1110]

Yea I've had the V281 for a few months now, and it's basically neutral with a slight liquid overall tone to it. There was never any burn in, or change to the sound in all these months, and it handled every headphone perfectly. Even without being able to try different dacs I still feel like I'm listening to the dac rather than the amp, pretty cool how it does that. Also no glare or anything like that, unless the song/sound files had it in them/the headphones are prone to it. I think in general the V281 just reminds me of sound is heard naturally, like the way it would sound to you if you heard it live, but not like a concert, like if you were in a room where musicians were playing (Ignoring soundstage). Meaning it sounds the way your ears would interpret it if you weren't listening to a recording, whether its electric guitar through an amp, or acoustic drums, or even EDM before it gets mastered and compressed, music and audio in general don't really sound warm or analytical or neutral in real life, it sounds like whatever the instrument or source of the sound makes it sound like, but our ears will tend to hear it with a high degree of detail, and slight liquid/organic tone, regardless of the instrument. So for an amp to be able to get out of the way like this, is something I really value highly, because I play drums and have played in heavy bands, and a lot of the time I find that amps and headphones and dacs just don't do a great job or recreating what those sounds really sound like if you were in the room they were being made.


Most audio reproduction gear will make it sound warm, neutral, or bright, and everything in between. but those aren't very good ways to recreate sound, instead those do make for great ways to please someone who wants to hear sound in a certain way, which is fine, dont get me wrong, but I'm just saying the V281 is recreating sounds, in my opinion, the most proper way sound should be recreated. It's hard for me to find good descriptive words to explain this, because its not really neutral, or organic, or liquid, or whatever, it just....correct, to what I'm familiar with in real instruments or music creation sources.

I also experience a similar thing with the Alpha Primes going balanced through the V281.

And I'm just using a schiit bifrost uber as the dac to achieve all this.

V281 is outstanding with the Primes. Best combination of amp and headphones I've heard.

 

[Nomax]

 

[xaval]

Thanks, but Fried had already made a notice of this a few weeks ago.
 
Nomax, when is the king coming afterall

?

 

[Tony1110]

Doesn't look like Thomann have put their prices up yet.

 

[naimless]

No they haven't and they are cheaper than violectric's own website even before the price rise,I've ordered mine from thomann only trouble is they are out of stock at the moment so I now have to wait.

 

[roskodan]

they give 3 years warranty as well as 30 days money back, and sincerely i don't think there will be a street price increase, retailers, third parties have always better prices somehow