So ... where do I begin?
I guess it starts with QED's introduction of the Digit outboard DAC in 1992 (I think). I got into high quality audio reproduction a year or so earlier, spurred on by my enthusiast brother Dirk. Being a students at the time, and imagining all sorts of wonderful ways we could change the world for the better, we approached QED for the South African agency. At least that way we could make a couple of ageing multi-bit CD players a whole lot better by selling truckloads of Digits into the South African market. And So Audio Influx cc (trading as Sound Solutions) was born ...
Brilliant and cost-effective as the Digit was it never sold in any meaningful numbers. I cant imagine that we sold more than about 40 or 50 in 3 to 4 years. The Digit was a break-through product, a VolksDAC of sorts, but poorly pitched for the SA market .... too expensive (and odd at the time) for casual listeners and too mundane and plasticky for high-roller high-end enthusiasts.
Even if our QED agency was no great commercial success, it literally afforded us the opportunity to play with some very exotic hi-fi toys at a time when most of our peers waitered for pocket money. We stopped representing QED around 1996, and I basically lost interest in all things hi-fi for the better part of 20 years. But I held onto some classic relics from the early 90's:
- a couple of QED Digits, including an Opto with the Toslink input, hot-rodded and running off a 12V battery
- a Conrad Johnson PV10 valve pre-amp, de-phono staged and component upgraded past PV10B spec
- a lovely 60W pure Class A Pass Aleph 5 power amp my boet built for me as a DIY project, using only the very best componentry, layout and assembly techniques
- a pair of Apogee Centaurs, that's the middle model of the Centaurus ribbon hybrid speakers with 26" midrange/tweeter ribbons and conventional 8" Vifa bass drive units
The Apogees fell victim cats and / or kids, and were parked in a corner for over 10 years in favour of a pair of AR Classic 5's (also held over from our trading days, and still a benchmark bookshelf design for me). The CJ and Pass amps made way for a Cambridge Audio integrated (with remote nogal).
Then about a month ago Dirk called me up ... he had secured two pairs of Centaurus Minors in non-working but salvable condition. Importantly all four ribbons were intact. So we arranged for a pair of ribbons to be shipped to Pretoria, and fortunately one survived unscathed ... the other had snapped in transit. Took me a good couple of nights to strip and reassemble the Centaurs, but Saturday morning I was ready to play ...
So I hastily set up the system ... my Mede8er MED500X2 provided a steady stream of FLAC file 1's and 0's and I hooked everything up using whatever cables I had available (Cardas 75 ohm digital cable, Van den Hul The First and Kimber PBJ interconnects and Kimber 4PR speaker cable ... all very nice period pieces in their own right).
After a couple of false starts (setting up the Centaurs with ribbons on the outside, swopping speaker phase to correct for the CJ's phase inversion, sorting out a ground-loop hum, and finding the oh-so-precise listening sweetspot of the Apogees) I was ready to rock and roll.
I settled in for some serious critical listening for the first time in nearly 20 years ... and my oh my was I impressed with what I heard. Delicate and utterly transparent treble, expansive width, height and depth, effortless midrange detail, tight and tuneful bass. I sat through entire geekiest of geek Chesky test recordings and ticked off all the supposed hallmark elements of truly high quality audio reproduction ... High-Resolution, Depth, Atmosphere, Midrange Purity, Naturalness, Transparency, Presence, Visceral Impact, Rhythm & Pace, Focus, Holographic Imaging, Transients, Bass Resonance, Dynamics ... all there in bucket-loads. In the good sense. I could (and did) listen all day, exchanging audiophile plinky plonk for real music .... hell what good fun that was!
So what would I change ... well, nothing really. Except the Mede8er becomes unresponsive sometimes when playing really dense HD tracks, and also the Digit's restriction to 44.1khZ / 16-bit playback. If it wasn't for that I could happily live with the sonic performance. So I really need to find a better, more modern source. Maybe even settle for a digital pre-amp which will sadly see the Conrad Johnson being shelved again. And I am pretty sure modern digital sources will be far superior to what I had in the 90's for much less money in relative terms, such is the technological progress in this field.
But as for the amps and speakers ... I don't think there has been many meaningful improvements in stereo playback 20 years.
Prove me wrong!
I guess it starts with QED's introduction of the Digit outboard DAC in 1992 (I think). I got into high quality audio reproduction a year or so earlier, spurred on by my enthusiast brother Dirk. Being a students at the time, and imagining all sorts of wonderful ways we could change the world for the better, we approached QED for the South African agency. At least that way we could make a couple of ageing multi-bit CD players a whole lot better by selling truckloads of Digits into the South African market. And So Audio Influx cc (trading as Sound Solutions) was born ...
Brilliant and cost-effective as the Digit was it never sold in any meaningful numbers. I cant imagine that we sold more than about 40 or 50 in 3 to 4 years. The Digit was a break-through product, a VolksDAC of sorts, but poorly pitched for the SA market .... too expensive (and odd at the time) for casual listeners and too mundane and plasticky for high-roller high-end enthusiasts.
Even if our QED agency was no great commercial success, it literally afforded us the opportunity to play with some very exotic hi-fi toys at a time when most of our peers waitered for pocket money. We stopped representing QED around 1996, and I basically lost interest in all things hi-fi for the better part of 20 years. But I held onto some classic relics from the early 90's:
- a couple of QED Digits, including an Opto with the Toslink input, hot-rodded and running off a 12V battery
- a Conrad Johnson PV10 valve pre-amp, de-phono staged and component upgraded past PV10B spec
- a lovely 60W pure Class A Pass Aleph 5 power amp my boet built for me as a DIY project, using only the very best componentry, layout and assembly techniques
- a pair of Apogee Centaurs, that's the middle model of the Centaurus ribbon hybrid speakers with 26" midrange/tweeter ribbons and conventional 8" Vifa bass drive units
The Apogees fell victim cats and / or kids, and were parked in a corner for over 10 years in favour of a pair of AR Classic 5's (also held over from our trading days, and still a benchmark bookshelf design for me). The CJ and Pass amps made way for a Cambridge Audio integrated (with remote nogal).
Then about a month ago Dirk called me up ... he had secured two pairs of Centaurus Minors in non-working but salvable condition. Importantly all four ribbons were intact. So we arranged for a pair of ribbons to be shipped to Pretoria, and fortunately one survived unscathed ... the other had snapped in transit. Took me a good couple of nights to strip and reassemble the Centaurs, but Saturday morning I was ready to play ...
So I hastily set up the system ... my Mede8er MED500X2 provided a steady stream of FLAC file 1's and 0's and I hooked everything up using whatever cables I had available (Cardas 75 ohm digital cable, Van den Hul The First and Kimber PBJ interconnects and Kimber 4PR speaker cable ... all very nice period pieces in their own right).
After a couple of false starts (setting up the Centaurs with ribbons on the outside, swopping speaker phase to correct for the CJ's phase inversion, sorting out a ground-loop hum, and finding the oh-so-precise listening sweetspot of the Apogees) I was ready to rock and roll.
I settled in for some serious critical listening for the first time in nearly 20 years ... and my oh my was I impressed with what I heard. Delicate and utterly transparent treble, expansive width, height and depth, effortless midrange detail, tight and tuneful bass. I sat through entire geekiest of geek Chesky test recordings and ticked off all the supposed hallmark elements of truly high quality audio reproduction ... High-Resolution, Depth, Atmosphere, Midrange Purity, Naturalness, Transparency, Presence, Visceral Impact, Rhythm & Pace, Focus, Holographic Imaging, Transients, Bass Resonance, Dynamics ... all there in bucket-loads. In the good sense. I could (and did) listen all day, exchanging audiophile plinky plonk for real music .... hell what good fun that was!
So what would I change ... well, nothing really. Except the Mede8er becomes unresponsive sometimes when playing really dense HD tracks, and also the Digit's restriction to 44.1khZ / 16-bit playback. If it wasn't for that I could happily live with the sonic performance. So I really need to find a better, more modern source. Maybe even settle for a digital pre-amp which will sadly see the Conrad Johnson being shelved again. And I am pretty sure modern digital sources will be far superior to what I had in the 90's for much less money in relative terms, such is the technological progress in this field.
But as for the amps and speakers ... I don't think there has been many meaningful improvements in stereo playback 20 years.
Prove me wrong!
