Jumping into the Lampy Pond w Big 7 SE

Odyssey said:
After extensive discussions with Mike I am taking the plunge with the Big 7.

In fact Mike spec'd it out for me.

It is going to be single ended since this will allow more tube choices down the road. Of course it is DSD256 with the R2R PCM.

It will have the EML 45 Lampi Edition tubes and the EML 5u4g Rectifier.

All packaged together in the optional flight case.

I also purchased from Mike the Lumin U1 that will manage the music. The U1 is special as it takes the best from the S1 sans DAC. The U1 also has two USB outputs for using different DACS. Nice.

Three weeks until Lampy heaven!

Thank you Mike!
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Congratulations.

I have been edging towards that decision to buy the lampi dac as well but have not quite taken the plunge.
 
FlexibleAudio said:
I must say Leroy, I am very curious to get your thoughts on this comparison. As I have said here before (and been vigorously taken to the wood shed for doing so) my experience with both the B7 and GG at Axpona was that they exude all of the goodness of DHT's along with their limitations. As such, I would love it as a second dac but not as my reference. As my experience was only a few hours at a show, I am excited to hear how well it stacks up in your room with Soulution and Raidho.
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Hi Paul,

Your doggy avatar is so cute!

Ken
 
FlexibleAudio said:
I must say Leroy, I am very curious to get your thoughts on this comparison. As I have said here before (and been vigorously taken to the wood shed for doing so) my experience with both the B7 and GG at Axpona was that they exude all of the goodness of DHT's along with their limitations. As such, I would love it as a second dac but not as my reference. As my experience was only a few hours at a show, I am excited to hear how well it stacks up in your room with Soulution and Raidho.
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Hi Paul,

Out of curiosity, what limitations did you feel you heard? Having owned one for a while now, I can say that it will not have quite the hard hitting bottom end of a reference SS design but that aside, I don't see other limitations. The palpability, 3-dimensionality, tone, and soundstage just aren't achieved by any other dacs that I ever heard. If those traits are important, I can't see a substitute.
 
Audiophile bill said:
Hi Paul,

Out of curiosity, what limitations did you feel you heard? Having owned one for a while now, I can say that it will not have quite the hard hitting bottom end of a reference SS design but that aside, I don't see other limitations. The palpability, 3-dimensionality, tone, and soundstage just aren't achieved by any other dacs that I ever heard. If those traits are important, I can't see a substitute.
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Great post. You nailed it.
 
Audiophile bill said:
Hi Paul,

Out of curiosity, what limitations did you feel you heard? Having owned one for a while now, I can say that it will not have quite the hard hitting bottom end of a reference SS design but that aside, I don't see other limitations. The palpability, 3-dimensionality, tone, and soundstage just aren't achieved by any other dacs that I ever heard. If those traits are important, I can't see a substitute.
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Hello Bill,

There is an old MSB Select Dac thread around here where my thoughts are well documented. (I would rather stick an ice pick in my ear than go through that again with the Lampi crowd.) I love DHT's and almost bought the GG but decided to go with something I felt had a bit lower noise floor, was a bit more full range, and was a bit more resolving as my reference. It was very much a personal thing. I still want to get tubes somewhere in my digital chain just as I have on my analog side and plan to play around down the road. The Lampi will be at or near the top of the list when I do.
 
The Lampi is definitely a great DAC. I had a chance to demo the GG for 2 weeks. It has a very unique sound that I know appeals to a lot of people. I was pretty sure I was going to jump on the Lampi bandwagon. But Mike told me that I needed to be sure. I was down to my last play money. So after listening for a couple of weeks, I put my Lumin back in the system. For me, and in my system and room, the Lumin felt like home. I instantly started tapping my feet and knew immediately that I would stay with the Lumin.
Now I'm not even suggesting that the Lumin is superior to the Lampi. What I am saying is once you get to this level it's all subjective. And a lot of it is system synergy,personal tastes, and room interaction.
I totally understand the Lampi love, but for me and my tastes, the Lumin won out.
Instead of the Lampi, I spent my money on what I consider a world class turntable. And I've not looked back.
 
Mark. Are you sure not buying back the Classic 1 again ? :P

Did you ever chance to hear the Big 7 single end ?


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Mark... You make an interesting observation and point about equipment and room synergy.

How I wonder would a Lampizator B7 or GG resolve in an all tube rig such as my McIntosh rig with a C1000T and MC2301s as the drivers?

I have not dismissed the possibility altogether but lost interest after learning that Lampizator don't have electrical compliance certification in some of their export markets as yet.
 
Steve said:
Mark... You make an interesting observation and point about equipment and room synergy.

How I wonder would a Lampizator B7 or GG resolve in an all tube rig such as my McIntosh rig with a C1000T and MC2301s as the drivers?

I have not dismissed the possibility altogether but lost interest after learning that Lampizator don't have electrical compliance certification in some of their export markets as yet.
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Steve, That's a great question. In my experience with the GG, I feel that the Lampi might be too much of a good thing with your tube McIntosh gear.

In system that leans to the cool side of neutral, the Lampi could be a savior!
 
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Steve said:
Mark... You make an interesting observation and point about equipment and room synergy.

How I wonder would a Lampizator B7 or GG resolve in an all tube rig such as my McIntosh rig with a C1000T and MC2301s as the drivers?
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Lampi has been used in many all tube as well as SS. Mine was with ARC reference pre and power, and then with Jadis and VAC.

I think people need to keep in mind that Lampi is a beat like TT (though not that complex), but like you can change cartridges from Koetsu to Ortofon, so cna you change, and upgrade valves..some are more neutral and dynamic, some sweeter and colored, etc.

That is precisely why you see long term owners so happy, because they keep getting surprised by the dac as time moves along. I personally wasn't that thrilled during my audition week though it sounded great.
 
I have a Lampi Big7 and a Lumin S1. I could easily be happy with either DAC, long term. Both are great DACs, and while they have differences, the things they have in common put them at the top of the list of musical DACs I have owned.
 
Chord Dave and older brother Hugo also do not have any type of DAC chips but rather the analogue conversion is discrete using pulse array.


This type of methodology is appealing to me in a DAC.

(I have 3 Sabre based DACs and do not want another. Indeed, the Denon AVP implementation of Burr Brown PCM-1796 dual differential DACs (four per channel) gets the most hours in the household. Not as detailed but also not as hard either.... Perhaps a bit unfair to the MCD1100, this McIntosh implementation is quite good for the Sabre.)

Given the support in the Lampizator camp which if I understand correctly is akin to what Lukasz is doing also.

But there are also significant differences such as Lampizator preference to tone its output with tubes and Chord is strictly solid state.

There's also the small footprint of Dave despite a bunch of other high-tech built into it plus its interfaces make it appealing.
 
Steve - food for thought: the benefit of the Lampizator is that you can swap tubes and totally change the sound of the DAC. The Lampizator with WE 101D Replica's is completely different from a Lampizator with WE 300b's and once again different with EML 45's, 2A3's and the list goes on.

I know friends with Lampizator's who are big into classical music and they feel the WE 101D's are a dream tube setup. Others are into more jazz listening, and find the 300b's divine. I think the EML 45's are a great all around tube. I'm looking forward to trying the Lampizator Mesh EML 45's.

Fine tuning of the Lampizator is done with the rectifier tube. A Brimar sounds totally different from a WE 274b and so on. Yes, you can drive yourself batty with all the various tube combinations, but that's half the fun. You can change output tubes and rectifiers to get the sound you want. More bass, sweeter, more dynamics, greater separation, etc.

The organic nature of tubes in the chain makes digital more palatable for some. For others, the added noise and "coloration" is not to their liking. As they say, YMMV.
 
I agree with the comments from others although I do feel that I personally wouldn't want tubes, tubes and more tubes - i.e. Lampi > tube pre > tube power. It is all a matter of taste but again as others have said you can tailor your Lampi as you can a vinyl rig.
 
Bill - I've often felt the same way - until now. My Avantgarde's are like a microscope and the minute I put something solid state in the system, you can tell. I'm going through this right now with the Air Tight phonostage vs the DSA SS phono.
 
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