Day trippin'

i've just returned from a couple of demo's at Radlett Audio in St Albans and Ultimate Sonics in north london, mainly i was demoing cd players however as neither shop could accurately duplicate my system it was more of a listen to some systems....
music for the demos centered around
the blue man group - time to start & i feel love
Safri Duo - Crazy benny
Gomez - shot shot & in our gun
Tricky - black steel
Ozrics - holohedron
joss stone - the chokin' kind
EST - mingle in the mincing machine
jackyl - the lumberjack.
+ some others.

1st up was Radlett Audio (RA) i mainly wanted to have a listen to the Tube Technologies Fusion 64, basicly a chord dac 64, without the ram buffer and with a transport built in. they also lined up a cd5i and a cdx2 with naim 202 / Hicap / 250.2 amps. speakers were pmc ob1's (i think, the tall floor standers anyway).
first off i played the 2 blue man group songs and the safri duo on the cd5i. basicly what i got what i was expecting, slightly recessed bass and indistinct treble but rythmicly good. the sound was confined to each speaker, mirroring what dom experienced but not what i heard from mikes so i suspect the sample today was very cold. moving swiftly on to the TT fusion 64.
This immediately gave a soundstage where there was none before, also it loved vocals, joss stone was just so emotional. Unfortunately the heavily rhythmic blue man group and safri duo were not kind to it at all with the bass getting very murky. it could on occasion get a bit agressive with the treble, surprising, as it has a class a valve output stage which i'd not immediately associate with this behaviour. also there seemed to be an amount of low level noise or hash which was very stongly highlighted when the cdx2 came out to play.
The cdx2 had a more wall of sound aproach to the soundstage rather than the fusion's more traditional soundstage. it tended to hang the music behind the speakers where the Fusion moved things forward. To be honest i preferred the fusion in this respect but the cdx2 just killed it in the bass, bass lines were taut and identifieable where on the fusion they were a blurr. Also as i mentioned the cdx2 produced the cliched 'inky black' background in a very noticable way - even the moon mk1 i listened to later on didn;t match it in this respect. That said the cdx2 really didn;t seem like a big step beyond what i have at home, whether this was to do with the amps, the omega cable i use or what i don;t know but on the day it didn;t do it. So neither of these really impressed me enough to (potentially) spend money.

back in the car to drive down to Ultimate sonics in north london. now a couple of people here have had dealings with them before and have experienced difficulties so i was 'en guarde' however the guys (and girls) there were nothing but polite and helpful so i can only surmise personality conflicts - they even had decent brewed coffee.
I went here initially to hear a mk1 sim audio eclipse player - similar to robbos but an older version with an hdcd filter that does the sound no favours at all. fortunately this can be bypassed by linking the digital in and out on the back of the player - the difference this makes is not subtle! and i suspect i'd run it in this configuration if i went for this. unfortunately the system was even further away from my own than that at RA, with the eclipse running through a top end edge battery pre amp and edge laser biased power amp. speakers were big silverlines (not sure of the model). there was also a PS audio conditioner hooked up to the sim but i'm not sure about the amps.
the sound was a very good mix of the Fusion and the CDX2, rythmicly it had both beat whilst the soundstage was better than the fusions. Detail is the overriding thing i remember from hearing the eclipse mk2 before and the mk1 is no different, however there is a level of low level noise / hash that can obscure some detail (this wasn;t the case with the mk2)- the cdx was letting me hear, clearly, little bits of the mix on BMG's version of i feel love (some echoing vocals at very low volume levels near the end) which neither the eclipse or the fusion let me hear well. i spent about 2 hours listening to the eclipse and couldn;t really fault it for much except the lack of ultimate detail the cdx2 showed.
on the way out of the shop i was chatting to the bloke there and he mentioned the new 'g' range of edge amps that had just been released ('only' 6k the pair instead of the 17k for the ones i'd been listening to ). low and behold they were hooked up to some mid range silverline speakers and a cec tl2x transport and cec DX71 dac. the guy (senanu i think!) put on some audiophile sounding stuff and it didn;t sound bad... he then let me put on the safri duo.. well bloody hell it sounded good, a very liquid top end with no harshness and a very driving bottom end with plenty enough punch for me. unfortunately i had to leave so i didn;t get a chance to see if the BMG i feel love track had the detail dug out of it but i definately want to go back and have another listen to that one. the only problem is that the tl2x / dx71 is about 4 grand, way above my budget - but - cec do, do a cheaper transport and the dx71 is variable output...... and i've seen both at a reduced price and senanu is willing to 'deal'......
to be continued....
cheers


julian

 

Julian, Great write up!

I wish I could have come along with you this afternoon rather than suffering the torture of watching England lose to Ireland. Still Ireland thoroughly deserved their victory so well done to them.

It sounds like more research is to be done on the CEC players then. I've no experience of these at all. Interesting to hear you comments on the Eclipse mark1. I havent heard a mark 1 so I dont really know if it shares the amazing deatail retrieval of the mark2. From what you say though, it lacks nothing in terms of PRaT which is good.

Was the CDX2 bare i.e. without external power supply? How much is the CDX2 going for?

Cheers, Robbo

 

Good right up Julian.

What's next on the audition list?

 

thanks guys, from what i heard today and remember from hearing the mk2 i'd say that the mk1's detail retrieval isn't as amazing as the mk2's, certainly the performance takes a huge step forward when bypassing the hdcd filter but it was going through a bnc=>rca, coax cable, bnc=>rca, even if no adapters were used there'd still be 2 connections and a cable in the signal path which will surely introduce jitter and fry the detail. this just goes to show that naim do kind of know what they are doing when it comes to getting the transport / dac interface right. the cdx2 was bare, i realise that adding an xps2 will up the ante again but this also doubles the price! for a lot less than that i can get the same performance. - oh how the mighty naimie eats his words....
i'm definately going to be investigating the cec transport / dac combo some more i'll probably see if i can get a listen next weekend - robbo - you're more than welcome to come along if you want - pm me.
hopefully next on the list is a bow zz8, i'm waiting for the dealer in welwyn to get it delivered and then i'll go for a listen. i'm also looking at a metronome T1-i signature and an oracle 1500, the trouble with these are that getting to hear one before buying will be very difficult. i'm talking to the importer of the oracle but haven;t heard anything from the metronome guys as yet although it's only been a few days.
cheers


julian

 

Ive had a look at the CEC websitire and man, these things are wacky. A belt driven CDP indeed! The objectivists/theorists are going to love this.



How about this one Julian :-

 

robbo,
looks wise it's definately got what it takes however i need both my kidneys at present and my bank balance won;t stretch to 11k at present.

the belt drive thing will probably drive the objectivists mad as all transports sound the same but from the little i heard i thought it was doing the right things.
cheers


julian

 

shame you didnt get to hear them at home mate.

making objective choices is so damn hard hearing different kit in different shops.. suppose some home dems are going to come along?

NB
I thought I saw some belt-driven transports at the emporium, but dont know if they are still there.

Sounds like you had fun!

 

bottleneck,
rest assured if / when i do finally buy something it will be on the strict understanding that i get 2 weeks to try it at home to see if it fits with what i've already got. if they won't do that they don't get my money - as simple at that.
cheers


julian

 

I've always wanted to get a proper listen to a CEC transport/DAC set-up, especially one of their more affordable (or not) bottom of the range models. Shame I've got to be at work next Saturday otherwise I'd love to come along for a listen.

The only CEC piece of kit I've heard was a few years back at one of the smaller Heathrow shows where JJ was using the top of the range belt driven top loader (the bottom picture in Robbo's above post) going into a £30k Boulder DAC. Considering this was what, nearly £50k's worth a CD front-end was it really that much better than £5k's worth of carefully choosen stuff - hmm...

There's a ZZ8 on Hififorsale ATM going for £1700, if you were willing to take a gamble.

 

heny,
the cec transport is 969 ukp and the dac is 1745 so they aren't too mentally priced - it's still a fair whack though.
i saw the zz8 you mention but there does seem to be something something of a risk and as i said i want to listen to one before taking the plunge.

cheers


julian

 

Julian,

just to say that I've sent you another PM, but also to put my s/h Meridian 602 transport in the open for other to have their say.

You noticed the AudioSynthesis Transcend/Dax Decade combo in my sig. The advice I got, which I've not regretted, is to focus first on the dac - and I liked what I heard and read of the Dax Decade (not only its detail and the way it got me foot tapping) but also by also being a pre-amp I saved money and worries about the pre-amp (& interconnect).

I was aware of the Transcend, and of the arguments (too technical for me) about Ncode between the Transcend and the Dax, but thought it out of my league financially. So I set out on the Meridian transport trail: first acquiring a s/h 200 and then a p/x 602; the latter being much the better.

I then stumbled over an offering of a Sony CDP that had been 'modded' by AudioSynthesis as a Transcend - stripped to bare essentials but with Ncode. It was a *very good price*, and I've been delighted ever since - and I'm sticking with that as the source for CDs for quite some while.

As I've said in my PM, I get my money back on the Meridian 602 transport at £450. Else I have to lose some in the trade-in for the JMlab 905 speakers I'm acquiring from local dealer as upgrade on my Dittons.

hth

 

Yes, Robbo! I wonder what those who argue about there not being differences between transports would make of the CECs when they are being compared alongside conventional transports. From my experiences, the most liquid, almost vinylesque sounds I've heard from any transport/DAC combo have been when the DAC was being fronted by a CEC transport and that includes some of the most popular DACs around today. Earlier CEC transports didn't handle bass so well but with some of the later models, there has been some improvement in that region. Although I did not pair the DAC64 to a belt-driven transport when I had it here, I have a feeling that it would sound have sounded much better (for my tastes) when driven by a belt-driven transport than with a conventional transport even though people say that the DAC64 is not transport sensitive.

IIRC, Parasound of the U.S (if they still make digital components) made belt-drive CDPs and Burmester of Germany also use belt-drive transports (probably made by CEC) in their CD players.




Enjoy the music,

Lawrie.

 

Ju, I hear what you're saying re the ZZ8. That CEC combo does seem quite a bit cheaper than I'd imagined. Will be very interesting to see what you end up with, as you're actually shopping in roughly the same price teritory as I am for the replacement to my trusty Accuphase/dCS combo.

Interesting, didn't realise that Parasound made belt-drive transports too, but I'm very sure that there is definitely some kind of relationship going on between CEC and Burmester. Burmester probably buy in bare transports from CEC and modify them to their own specs, that's my guess.

 

i think the parasound transports were in fact the cec's. i believe parasound were the north american distributors. i think this has now moved to a canadian company.
cheers


julian

 

CEC seem to have withdrawn most of their transports from the market in Japan. I wonder if they're still making them.
They certainly look fab - especially the one that looks like a brick of solid Inca Gold. Kewl.

 

i think they are about to re-vamp their entire range, the canadian distributor has hints and a few pics of their new stuff but their web site doesn;t seem to mention them at all... weird.
cheers


julian

 

I hope that it is just a revamp. Could well be the case.