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Ayre Acoustics V-3 power amplifier Sam Tellig Comments

Sam Tellig also wrote about the Ayre V-3 in August 1996 (Vol.19 No.8):

"It's nice that the Ayre V-3 amplifier sounds so tubelike, but why not just buy a tube amplifier?"

Charlie Hansen laughed.

"If you can put up with the high prices and maintenance of tube gear, then go for it. But most people don't want to put up with the expense or the idiosyncrasies of tubes.

"Look," Charlie continued, "great tube amps still have a little bit of midrange magic that no solid-state amp I have ever heard quite gets. But the V-3 does many things better than most tube amps do. It's…

Ayre Acoustics V-3 power amplifier Sam Tellig Comments part 2

Charlie licked his chops
If I understand Charlie, eliminating noise is a good part of what the Ayre V-3 is all about. The balanced circuitry, lack of feedback, and two-stage power supply are all intended to reduce noise—ie, interference with the musical signal. Perhaps this is what gives the Ayre its air. And not only its air, but also its freedom from graininess, hardness, edginess—all the bad, bad things that transistorphobes associate with solid-state.

"It doesn't quite sound like a tube amp," I told Charlie, trying to get a rise out of him. I always like to be provocative, but…

Audio: The View From Outside

I have a confession to make: I play contrabassoon . . . for a living. Now to many this may not seem like such a sin, but within the musical community my instrument is viewed with about as much regard as the common garden slug. This perception is not completely unjustified; often being relegated to roles depicting monsters and evil, along with the occasional digestive grunt, helps perpetuate the general disdain for the contra. However, playing the lowest (non-keyboard) instrument in the symphony orchestra gives me a somewhat different perspective on things, not unlike that of a dwarf in a…

Audio: The View From Outside Page 2

Therefore, I take this opportunity to suggest a practical, if not philosophical, approach to the subject by offering some of the criteria that this musician uses in evaluating high-fidelity components and recorded performances. I certainly don't want to come off sounding pontifical---contrabassoonists should never pontificate---but most of the elements of performance I want to discuss, while familiar and obvious to a musician, may not be so to the average reader.

Presentation of all musical lines with integrity:
In the music business, we have a hackneyed, but all too often relevant…

Audio: The View From Outside Page 3

It should be obvious that if a loudspeaker or other component cannot reproduce these rather substantial differences in attack and tonal weight, the end result is nothing more than a homogenized, bland, and gutless representation of the original. Those who subscribe to this school of living-room sound need not concern themselves with this particular problem, since their musical tastes usually lean toward the repertoire most often heard in elevators.

Musical accuracy of program material:
A can of worms unto itself, and the pet peeve of musicians. Unless the listeners have firsthand…

Fine Tunes #42

"Hey, J-10!" John Atkinson called from the hallway outside my office. "I liked your October 'Fine Tunes'!"

"Hey, JA! I wrote it in Paris—whad'dya expect, chopped liver?" I thought I was being clever. A sure sign of senility.

JA's face changed almost imperceptibly and he headed into his office. My, aren't your feet big, Mr. Scull!

But in the spirit of that October "Fine Tunes," I hope you'll use a few of following tweaks from my bulging grab-bag of tweaks to improve your audio system.

The first concerns reader Cyrus Won (who prefers that his e-mail address not be…

Channel Islands Audio VHP•1 headphone amplifier

Back in March, I wrote a reviewlet of Channel Islands Audio's VHP•1 headphone amplifier for the Stereophile eNewsletter. (What—you aren't receiving that free download yet? Well, log on to www.stereophile.com and opt in.) The VHP•1 has continued to enchant me—reason enough to examine it in greater detail, I reckoned. But the real reason I returned to the VHP•1 ($349) is that CIA's Dusty Vawter recently sent me his new VAC•1 ($159), a replacement power supply for the VHP•1's stock wall-wart supply. Could a new power supply really offer a substantial improvement in performance?

Little…

Channel Islands Audio VHP•1 headphone amplifier Page 2

This was no small improvement, but it wasn't the biggest change the VAC•1 wrought. That would be its increase in dynamic contrast. I don't mean that the VAC•1 allowed the VHP•1 to play any louder. It may have done, but that wasn't what had me mining my CD collection for lost gems. With the VAC•1 powering the amp, there was more contrast between music and silence: where there was music, it seemed as if there was more of the stuff it was made from; where there wasn't, there was more nothing.

Is that clear? No—but it wasn't clear to me at first, either. I initially thought about it in…

Channel Islands Audio VHP•1 headphone amplifier Specifications

Sidebar 1: Specifications

VHP•1: headphone amplifier. THD+noise: 0.00014% (no reference level specified). Frequency range: 10Hz–100kHz.
Serial number of unit reviewed: HB7309.
Price: $349.

VAC•1: power supply. Input voltage: 115/230VAC. Output voltage: 14VAC at 1.44 amperes. Accessories: IEC AC cable, AC output cable.
Serial number of unit reviewed: AB3186.
Price: $159.

Both
Dimensions: Each: 4.40" (113mm) W by 2.65" (68mm) H by 4.40" (113mm) D.
Warranty: 1 year parts & labor.
Manufacturer: Channel Islands Audio, 567 W. Channel Islands Blvd., PMB 300…

Channel Islands Audio VHP•1 headphone amplifier Associated Equipment

Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment

Digital Sources: Musical Fidelity X-RayV3 CD player, X-DACV3 D/A converter, Apple iPod Mini.
Headphone Amplifiers: Musical Fidelity X-CanV3, Ray Samuels Audio Emmeline SR-71.
Headphones: AKG K-501, Etymotic ER-6S, Sennheiser HD-600 (with Stefan Audio Art Equinox cables) & HD-650.
Cables: Interconnect: Stereovox HDSE. AC: stock IEC cord from JA's wire trunk, Audience powerChord.—Wes Phillips