Step It Up Another Level

I've been fiddling with my main sound system for some time. Check here, and here, and here, and here. Not that there's been anything in particular wrong with it, mind you. It's just a fit of audiophilia nervosa, probably, but at the same time I want it to be better. Always better. I suppose this is the mindset that traps people into spending $100K on a pair of speakers or $20K on a power cord.

I'm not going there. I'm not. But I want very, very good sound. My ear is developed enough that I definitely qualify as an audiophile and not just some dweeb with more money than sense. I know my audio hawks from my handsaws, and I have extremely good taste in sound. (Or so I like to think. But I think it's true, just as I'm quite certain I have excellent taste in music overall.)

A quick review. I moved up from a very fine Luxman 505u integrated amp, supplied from a Bryston BDA-1 digital to analog converter, itself fed from my home computer using JRiver Media Center. Now, here's how I remember the process went:

The Bryston BDA-1 always needed a converter to get a decent sound through USB, for which I was using a nice Bryston USB to Digital Coax converter. But it died. I went back to an older D-Link converter, but I wanted to get this taken care.

Enter a new Bryston BDA-3 digital to analog converter, the current state of the art in all things Bryston. Hell of a fine DAC.

The Luxman integrated amp is a superb product, but at 100 watts per channel I wasn't sure if it was driving my big beautiful Bowers & Wilkins 803D speakers to their full potential. So I got into the market for something in the way of a separate power amplifier. I was almost about to pull the cord and get the Bryston 4B cubed – a proven master product. But then I became aware of a quirky American company, Schiit Audio (the name's a deliberate jab at fancy audiophile names) and their top of the line Tyr monoblock amplifiers. Beautiful big heavy things, 200 watts each – you need one for each channel – and old-school, just-the-facts-ma'am design. So I got them.

At that point I demoted the Luxman 505u to preamplifier status – just its preamplifier out going into the Tyrs. Which means about 2/3 of it was going to waste, but I was looking at that for the short term only.

Huge improvement. I was right; the B&W 803Ds definitely needed a shot of adrenalin. The Tyrs provided that. So I decided to explore a bit more Schiit and ordered their Kara+ preamplifier so I could retire the Luxman from its pre-amp status.

However, I wasn't happy with the Kara+. My system lost a lot of its bloom; strings didn't have the resonance they needed, etc. So I sent back the Kara+ and returned the Luxman to active duty.

I had some problems with the Bryston BDA-3. It didn't like being in my system with those big Tyr amps. It had trouble getting a lock on the USB signal. I've always found it to be a bit overly bright, while I recognize its stellar performance. I've also been a bit annoyed by its insistence on a fresh handshake with every new file – click click. You'd think it could just retain its previous settings until it got a file with a different bit depth or sample rate or something.

I had read drooling rave reviews of the Schiit Yggdrasil+ digital to analog converter, praised as out-performing super-expensive stuff from companies on the order of Berkeley Audio. So I got it and retired the BDA-3 to service in the upstairs stereo system.

The Yggdrasil+ is everything promised and then some. Best DAC you could ever imagine; just gorgeous, clear, accurate, but without that slight edge I was hearing in the Bryston. I haven't been as instantaneously happy with an audio product in a long time. It's a masterpiece.

I decided to add a CD transport – i.e., a CD player that doesn't have a built-in DAC, but plays directly out to a DAC. The Audiolab 7000 model fits the bill just fine and slipped into the system without the slightest hiccup.

Which led me back to the Luxman being used as a pre-amp. I had been reading a bunch of raves about the Bryston BD-19 preamplifier, once again a no-frills, old-school kind of preamp that's analog only and meticulous constructed out of the best materials.

So to finish things off for now, I popped for the BD-19 preamplifier. Today it arrived and I hooked it up.

Verdict: I have that same "oh, yes!!" reaction that I had to the Yggdrasil+. Even more, there seems to be a wonderful synergy between the Bryston and the three Schiit components -- the Yggdrasil+ and the two Tyr monoblock amplifiers.

So there it is. Now this is a system, dammit. It's clear and transparent, to be sure, but there's warmth without being unnatural. The soundstage is all-embracing and there's lots of depth. Stuff like cymbals and hi-hats in a jazz combo (yes, I'll listen to those for audio quality) don't have a touch of white noise about them. Everything is just fine. Love it, love it.

I'm happy now. And I don't think I'm going to be having another fit of audiophilia nervosa any time soon. I've made a massive improvement over these past few months, and it wasn't really that expensive. Total cost of the new components: about $12K. Combined with those wonderful Bowers & Wilkins 803Ds ($20K for the current equivalents) I have a wonderful sounding system for the price of a Toyota Camry.

And I have all the makings of a nice second system should I want – the Luxman 505u and Bryston BDA-3, plus an older Rotel CD player. I don't quite know what I want to do with those right now. Probably just keep them.