Me! Me! Me! Me! Me! Me!

Me and sub-90dB sensitive speakers and not SET amplifiers! I would rather raise money for Bush/Chaney campaign or to merry a Fidelity Investment business annalist.! However, it is what I am currently listening.

A couple weeks ago I put my paws on Dima Kireev’s amplifier. This is kind of one-stage hybrid that utilized Dima’s proprietary class “FAGB” operation. The amp is somewhere above 150W and can drive anything: from 2uF capacitor to an extra cheese pizza. I did submerge the output cables into the pizza souse and can testify that pepperonis were jumping in the pizza’s cheese well according the amplitude of the input signal… :-)

The amp now is under evaluation. It has no name but operationally I call it “The Breathe of Apocalypses”. This amp is a SS brother of Melquiades and it behaves accordingly so far. I kind of have those beautiful signs of the Melquiades’ dynamic anomalies. It is too early to make any further of final conclusion about it’s sound but even now there are few interesting things in that this amp does.

The loudspeakers are 88dB wonderful Scan-Speak 21W/8555-00 drivers in acoustic suspended sealed-inclosure and ribbon tweeters.

Rgs,
The Cat

Hi Kitty,

This combo is quite interesting and amazingly coincidental....I had scan speak 18W's sitting around from my old speakers and just recently had them put in sealed boxes.  I was using a Seas silk dome on top (in free air) but found out an old discontinued pair of, believe it or not, radio shack ribbons had a much more tonal respect.  I'm still struggling with finding a good baffle step for the crossover and ribbon xover points (no time!), but it still does several things correctly.

Keep us updated on this FAGB DimAmp...it would be interesting to see how much musical sauce this SS amp offers the pizza baking stone compared to the Melquiades.

Best,
Chirag

....and particularly for us - the software freaks, for whom the word “Dim” has an "added value"….  Sure I will keep informing how it goes…

The Scan-Speak’s SD-1 “smartly overhang” motors are very interesting and if your 18W is made around the SD-1 then it is it certainly the thing to try.

The caT

Chirag wrote:

Hey, what kind of crossovering is the DimAmp seeing?  Are you sticking to 1st order slopes even with the nasty breakups higher up in the 21W carbon woofer?

Chirag wrote:

btw, I have some midrange and midbass horns sitting next to me that I'll get a chance to utilize after an exam in a few weeks...i won't have anything below 80hz or over 10k (or an amplifier!), but it will be a very interesting start....

:-)
The caT

Alex, I do not remember already the volume of those boxes, what is the deference? Thos drivers have an average sealed Qs and Fs I believe 19Hz, you might easy to circulate any volume you want. I slightly overdamped them, as usually, form where they should be…

Anyhow, I took the DimAmp today for a first time to walk out of my home. I stoped at a local friend of mine and let the amp to drive Kharma Ceramique 3.2 loudspeakers. The speakers have sub 90dB sensitively and power handling slightly less then 5W. This Kharma are king of solid-state sounding with typically aggressive Focal tweeter that was specially designed to whistle the brains out of the reviewers heads. With all imperfections the Kharma 3.2 are the best Kharma loudspeakers and I was interested how the DimAmp would be able to deal with them. Certainly those loudspeakers are very much from faultlessness but what do you want form a high-end product that cost juts $25.000?

To my surprise it was not bad. I mean I am looking at the time I spent listening all of it and I can’t recall the negative effect that I would typically attributed to amplifiers. Certainly the Kharma 3.2 is not a real loudspeaker in obsolete trims and they, while were driven by DimAmp, were the weakest element of that installation… However the one step at time. The DimAmp had swallowed the Kharma 3.2 easy and without even chewing. Now I need a serious contestant to drive… the prospective candidates are shaping up already… 

Meanwhile the amp is driving my woofer towers…

BTW, I think Dima has a Real name for his amp. I hope he would show up in here and would let us know it… The good thing should be referred by own name… It really deserves it.

Rgs,
The Cat

Romy the Cat wrote:

BTW, I think Dima has a Real name for his amp. I hope he would show up in here and would let us know it… The good thing should be referred by own name… It really deserves it.

Interestingly that I did not know what Zarathustra was. I heard this word somewhere as Richard Strauss’s composition but I never knew what was behind it. I would encourage whoever does not know to families themselves with what “Zarathustra” is all about.

http://www.livius.org/za-zn/zarathustra/zarathustra.htm

http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/n/n67a/

Rgs,
The caT

Hi Romy,

Could you explain a little more about the amp?  If I understand you correctly it is a 1 tube stage with solid state (Mosfet or Bipolar??) output.  If it is Mosfet then it is likely to be running without negative feedack, is that right?  I am quite interested in this kind of amplifier because I have heard a couple that can compete very well with the better tube amps I have heard.  My own amp is a Sphinx Project 14 that is using 2 tube stages and MOSFET output with no negative feedback.  I have also an amp on loan that is using only 1 tube stage and MoSFET output with no feedback.  Both can drive just about anything and both sound quite correct tonally and dynamically.  The sphinx is also biased about 30 watts Class A and the smaller amp is about 15 watts Class A, so under normal conditions they never leave Class A.  I don't know how many other hybrid amps you are familiar with, Romy, but another one to check out that I heard good sound from was the Pathos InPower. 

morricab wrote:

Could you explain a little more about the amp?  If I understand you correctly it is a 1 tube stage with solid state (Mosfet or Bipolar??) output.  If it is Mosfet then it is likely to be running without negative feedack, is that right?  I am quite interested in this kind of amplifier because I have heard a couple that can compete very well with the better tube amps I have heard.  My own amp is a Sphinx Project 14 that is using 2 tube stages and MOSFET output with no negative feedback.  I have also an amp on loan that is using only 1 tube stage and MoSFET output with no feedback.  Both can drive just about anything and both sound quite correct tonally and dynamically.  The sphinx is also biased about 30 watts Class A and the smaller amp is about 15 watts Class A, so under normal conditions they never leave Class A.  I don't know how many other hybrid amps you are familiar with, Romy, but another one to check out that I heard good sound from was the Pathos InPower.

Rgs,
Romy

morricab wrote:

Hi Romy, Could you explain a little more about the amp?  If I understand you correctly it is a 1 tube stage with solid state (Mosfet or Bipolar??) output.  If it is Mosfet then it is likely to be running without negative feedack, is that right?  I am quite interested in this kind of amplifier because I have heard a couple that can compete very well with the better tube amps I have heard.  My own amp is a Sphinx Project 14 that is using 2 tube stages and MOSFET output with no negative feedback.  I have also an amp on loan that is using only 1 tube stage and MoSFET output with no feedback.  Both can drive just about anything and both sound quite correct tonally and dynamically.  The sphinx is also biased about 30 watts Class A and the smaller amp is about 15 watts Class A, so under normal conditions they never leave Class A.  I don't know how many other hybrid amps you are familiar with, Romy, but another one to check out that I heard good sound from was the Pathos InPower.