- Thread Author
- #1
Greetings fellow sharks!
A Bladelius ASK landed on my front door step this morning. It's one of these:
Bladelius - ASK Integrated
It is now connected to only three things. My Shunyata Everest. My Magico M3 speakers. And my network router. A power cable. A pair of speaker cables. And a network cable. That is all.
What was connected to my M3's as of an hour ago was a seven box Esoteric Grandioso stack, Halcro reference monoblocks, a plethora of ridiculously expensive cables too many to count, and heavens knows what else. That whole shooting match weighs in at over 300kg and is worth about $300K.
The diminutive Bladelius ASK weighs in at a meager 20kg and is worth about $20K (with the optional DAC module). The weight of it is less than half the weight of the YG rack alone that carries all my other aforementioned electronics.
I eventually worked out how to configure the Bladelius ASK as a Spotify Connect device and now I'm streaming my favorites list on Spotify using an iPhone 6 as the controller. The sound and the simplicity of it is compelling. Actually, it's incredible. You couldn't want for anything more in the audiophile experience. And there is the dilemma. How can this single box possibly compete with the flagship Esoteric at >10 times the price? I'm here to tell you it's close. It's so close I'm in no rush to switch back to the main system. And it's not even their flagship integrated amp.
If you're in the market for a single box that does it all the Bladelius ASK should be on your radar. It's off the price vs performance Richter scale and gets my highest recommendation.
A Bladelius ASK landed on my front door step this morning. It's one of these:
Bladelius - ASK Integrated
It is now connected to only three things. My Shunyata Everest. My Magico M3 speakers. And my network router. A power cable. A pair of speaker cables. And a network cable. That is all.
What was connected to my M3's as of an hour ago was a seven box Esoteric Grandioso stack, Halcro reference monoblocks, a plethora of ridiculously expensive cables too many to count, and heavens knows what else. That whole shooting match weighs in at over 300kg and is worth about $300K.
The diminutive Bladelius ASK weighs in at a meager 20kg and is worth about $20K (with the optional DAC module). The weight of it is less than half the weight of the YG rack alone that carries all my other aforementioned electronics.
I eventually worked out how to configure the Bladelius ASK as a Spotify Connect device and now I'm streaming my favorites list on Spotify using an iPhone 6 as the controller. The sound and the simplicity of it is compelling. Actually, it's incredible. You couldn't want for anything more in the audiophile experience. And there is the dilemma. How can this single box possibly compete with the flagship Esoteric at >10 times the price? I'm here to tell you it's close. It's so close I'm in no rush to switch back to the main system. And it's not even their flagship integrated amp.
If you're in the market for a single box that does it all the Bladelius ASK should be on your radar. It's off the price vs performance Richter scale and gets my highest recommendation.