Digital source: Linn CD12 CD player, Accuphase DP-100/DC-101 SACD 24-bit/192kHz transport/DAC.
Preamplifiers: Audio Research Reference Two, Mark Levinson No.32 Reference.
Power amplifiers: Krell FPB350mc, Cary CAD-1610-SE, Linn Klimax Solo 500 (all monoblocks).
Loudspeakers: JMlab Utopia.
Cables: Digital: XLO The Limited. Interconnects: Cardas Neutral Reference and Golden Reference, Synergistic Research Designer's Reference, TARA The One/Air One. Speaker: TARA The One, Cardas Golden Cross, XLO The Limited. AC: Synergistic Research Designer's…
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Sidebar 1: Associated Equipment
Sidebar 3: Measurements
There's no such thing yet as a test DVD-A, so I checked the Technics DVD-A10's performance using a miscellany of test CDs and the Chesky Test and Sampler DVD-V, which has 24-bit test tones recorded (by Kevin Halverson of Muse Electronics) at 48kHz and 96kHz sample rates. The Technics doesn't play CD-Rs, so I couldn't check its jitter behavior with the Miller Audio Research Analyzer. All measurements were performed on the two-channel outputs.
The maximum output level was 2.153V, 0.66dB higher than the CD standard of 2V RMS. The output didn't invert absolute…
Fig.4 reveals that the DAC has good linearity, any error remaining below 3dB to below -115dB. As a result, the Technics' reproduction of an undithered 16-bit sinewave at -90.31dBFS (fig.5) was excellent, if not quite up to the standard set by the best CD players—or by the expensive Sony and Marantz SACD players, for that matter.
Fig.4 Technics DVD-A10, left-channel departure from linearity, 16-bit data (2dB/vertical div.).
Fig.5 Technics DVD-A10, waveform of undithered 1kHz sinewave at -90.31dBFS, 16-bit data.
Fig.6 shows an FFT-derived spectrum of the…
I repeated the test with other high-level combinations of high-frequency tones—11kHz+12kHz, 14+15kHz—and the noise floor remained low through the top octave. I then used a mix of 19kHz and 20kHz tones from a different test CD and again got the anomalous rise in the noise floor. However, to my surprise, when I repeated the test using the 48kHz or 96kHz sample-rate test signals on the Chesky DVD-V (fig.8), the spectrum revealed no top-octave problems. I can only assume that some aspect of the player's DVD engine, again most probably the Re-Master algorithm, is optimized for the 48kHz and 96kHz…
Kalman Rubinson's Followup review appeared in the April 2001 issue (Vol.24 No.4):
When Jonathan Scull offered to send the review sample of the Technics DVD-A10 on to me, I was so anxious to try a multichannel DVD-Audio player in my system that I didn't notice the attached strings: I had to write a Follow-Up to J-10's November 2000 review in the context of the multichannel home-theater system in my country place. A quickie audition in my familiar and comfortable main system would not do.
During these listening sessions, my ever-changing multichannel system comprised a California…
"My car is supercharged, not turbocharged, so you see there's no throttle lag," explained Yves-Bernard André as he reversed at what seemed like 80mph up a narrow cobbled Paris street. "D'accord," I mumbled, afraid to loosen the white-knuckled grip I had on the passenger grab handles. Yves-Bernard's car may have been pointing the right way down the one-way street, but it was not actually traveling in that direction. Okay, so it was 2am and the good residents of the Dix-septième Arrondissement were busy stacking Zs (en français, "emplier les ronflements"). But I still didn't think we would've…
Naturellement, there's no output inductor to define the ultimate high-frequency rolloff with highly capacitive loads, meaning that Yves-Bernard has either designed a circuit with plenty of ultrasonic phase margin, or he just likes living dangerously. (Optional air-cored coils are available for those with problem loudspeakers; the coil is placed between the output terminal and the positive speaker lead.) Negative feedback (said to be less than 20dB) is taken from the emitter resistors' common junction—the fuse therefore doesn't appear to be in the feedback path—and fed to the non-inverting…
Overall dynamics were punchy. Mahlerian climaxes were not reined in; Eddie Van Halen's essential guitar lines on Latoya's slightly-more-famous brother's "Beat It" raggedly ripped around the room. Even at high levels, the amplifier's sound didn't harden or become fatiguing. This amplifier has more power (la puissance, en français) than you'd expect from its modest physical size.
The YBA's midrange was more laid-back than the Audio Research Classic 120's, though the Mark Levinson No.20.6 monoblock softened the mid-treble further. The YBA wasn't reticent in the high treble, though, once…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Dual-mono solid-state power amplifier. Maximum power output: 70W into 8 ohms (18.5dBW), 140W into 4 ohms (18.5dBW). Frequency response: 5Hz-80kHz, -3dB. Input sensitivity: 120mV RMS for 1W/8 ohms, 1.1V RMS for rated output. Input impedance: 27k ohms. Output impedance: 0.02 ohms (damping factor quoted as 400 at 100Hz). Risetime: 3µs at 10kHz. S/N Ratio: 100dB (reference and conditions not stated). Power consumption: 100VA idling, 1000VA at full power.
Dimensions: 16.9" (430mm) W by 13" (330mm) D by 3.75" (95mm) H. Weight: 26.4 lbs (12kg).
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Sidebar 2: System
Due to both mid-life confusion and a change in distributor during this review's preparation, I used the YBA 2 HC and its matching preamplifier, the YBA 2, for an uncommonly long period of time—over two years (footnote 1). Thus it was also used with all the loudspeakers I've reviewed in that period. However, I fondly remember the Epos ES11s, Magnepan MG2.6/Rs, Spendor S100s, Acoustic Energy AE1s, Thiel CS2 2s, Vandersteen 3s, PSB Stratus Minis, Mission Cyrus 753s, Martin-Logan Aeriuses, and Harbeth HL-P3s. The comments are an amalgam of the listening notes I took with…