Absurdly expensive Linn Audiophile kit - Linn DS/2 and DS/3

[fetuhoe]

I am pleased to see that the 'Flat Earth Society' is still alive and well - an old industry nickname for Linn Products, Naim Audio and Rega Turntables.

I first met Ivor when he used to flog Sondeks out of the back of his Estate Car to find the petrol money back to Glasgow.

The job of marketing that Linn did with Charlie Brennan and help from Julian Vereker of Naim was astounding.

I spent my years as a student working in what was then a very high end audio shop 2 late evenings a week and Saturdays.

We sold Linns and Naims by the bucketful and then also became dealers for many other ridiculously expensive brands.

I stuck with this part time job for about 8 years and also worked during holidays until a 'real' job got in the way.

My Hifi is stuck deeply in the past and I still use a really old pair of Klipsch LaScala speakers, a Futtermann HC3 OTL Power amp which was really hard to find with a Valve pre-amp I designed and built during my time as a student.

I have sadly, parked my Well Tempered Turntable and use a Levinson Model 390S CD Player .

I do have a collection of old valve amps which I haven't used for a very long time but I am still trying to find a pair of Jadis Eurythmie II loudspeakers which are the only speakers which may make me give up the Klipsch.

I could be tempted by the Sonus Faber Guarneri Evolution loudspeaker but they are a bit too difficult to drive for the Futtermann.

Happy times and I really don't spend enough time listening any longer.

[Ashley James]

I have an Apple TV connected to my active speakers and sub, so that all my movies, music or whatever plays through them and I and visitors with Apple can stream to them as well. I have an Airport Express in my sitting room and another pair of smaller active speakers. Job done and no boxes.

Correctly implemented active speakers are astonishingly more clear and realistic sounding than old fashioned passives.

Phones and downloads are so good that hi fi has fallen off the radar now, even with my HD800s they sound as good as straight to Nagra digital recordings.

I was in audio manufacturing from eighty five till last year, having also had a spell when I was School in the sixties. My parents made me get a proper job.

[gridgway]

Ah, valve amps. Always wanted to play around with valves in my hifi.

Got anything going spare Chris?

Graham

[Ashley James]

Ah, valve amps. Always wanted to play around with valves in my hifi.

Got anything going spare Chris?

Graham

Although they don't measure as well, provided they're not clipping, you'd struggle to hear a difference between a valve amp and good solid state. It's the same with Class D too, which surprised me.

[gridgway]

Agreed! It's just a whim to have a go. I've contemplated making power amps from some of the kits around. But there are too many projects in the go at the moment!!

[Ashley James]

What astonishes me is not so much that ordinary and very modestly priced electronics are virtually all transparent now, but how good inexpensive speakers from the likes of Yamaha are. Things have really advanced in the last few years.

The Bose system in my twelve year old Boxster is appalling by comparison.

[fetuhoe]

Ah, valve amps. Always wanted to play around with valves in my hifi.

Got anything going spare Chris?

Graham

Although they don't measure as well, provided they're not clipping, you'd struggle to hear a difference between a valve amp and good solid state. It's the same with Class D too, which surprised me.

I thought that the 'Flat Earth Society' had won the argument about Ears and measurements quite a few years ago but it seems as if I was wrong

I was lucky to buy my Futtermann Amp because at the time they were being hand made by Julius H. Futtermann and very hard to get find.

The were the first Valve Amp and that could drive a low impedance speaker without an output transformer and ideally suit the characteristics of the LaScala which Paul Klipsch designed in around 1953 and is still in production.

HiFi News and Record review had arranged a massive Amplifier test with a panel of 10 reviewers including professional musicians and thier main contributors.

In the double-blind listening test the Futtermann was convincingly the winner outscoring the other amps by almost 2:1.

The final review, however, concluded that the Amplifier couldn't be recommended despite its victory in the listening tests because it measured poorly.

I read this review about a year after it was published, called the importer, Unilet HiFi in Guildford and asked it they still imported these amps.

It transpired that they never sold a single amp following the review and that they still had tthe test amp as 'the clown' who tested it split his cup of coffe into the amp when the lid was off and blew it up.

Everyone was scared to mess with it as it had a 650V DC rail so it stayed in its box.

I drove down to Guildford on the next Saturday and paid 50 quid compared to the £1000 + that was its retail price at the time it seemed quite a good buy but it could have been scrap and an ornament.

By Sunday afternoon it was repaired and working and has never missed a beat in the last 40 years.

I never measure its performance.

I think most people underestimate the performance of a valve amp in terms of how it sounds and the manner in which it clips.

If you take an amp such as an EAR 509 which is a 100 Watt Power amp using 2 x PL509 Line output Pentodes (Fiver each ?) used in TVs and a clever transformer based on the Macintosh MC275 (another legendary amp I have in my collection)

The 509 has to be one of the great HiFi bargains and in transient terms will produce around 900 Watts before it clips.

If we consider a good record such as a Mobile Fidelity Super disc the transients will be around 18dB and for a normal listening level quite a few transistor amps will clip.

When most tranny amps clip they also produce distortion for a finite time domain, I believe this time depends on the slew rate of the transistors used, before they recover. A Mosfet seems particularly spiteful in this respect whist IGBT devices seem much better.

A Valve, if it does clip, recovers instantly as the space charge in the valve dissipates the distortion as soon as the load causing the problem is removed hence it is much more difficult to hear them clip.

I also think they generally seem to have better transient performance but this is only a subjective observation.

The question is why do we want to reproduce music with a three-legged fuse when we already have the valve?

Joking apart - HiFi is just as subjective as cars and opinions as to what is a great HiFi are just as hardened as to what makes a great car.

My worst nightmare - Amcron Crown Amplifer, Yamaha NS1000 Speakers and an early Phllips 12 bit CD player.

I have also bcome so used to the sound of what I believe is a good system that it is now the standard by which i make judgements.

i am sure other people have a similar 'relationship' with their HiFi and why should we disagree.

[gridgway]

Sounds fabulous and very rare indeed! And by coincidence, Unilet was the first place where I bought hifi some 30 odd years ago! The Wharfedales are still in use.
Graham

[Ashley James]

In the early nineties, you could hear differences between Amplifiers, DACs and CD players etc, but slowly they evaporated until now you can be confident that in any properly conducted ABX, it's highly unlikely that anyone would detect a difference between any of it, phones included.

Electronics are transparent provided they are operated within their envelope. By comparison speakers are pretty terrible and passive crossovers even worse, though records and cartridges are worse still.

Hi fi is very dead now, the headphone market is over £150 million in the U.K. and cheap headphones better good hi fi. Specialist hi fi is probably worth about £10-15 million in this country. The only reason the likes of Linn and Naim had their day was because the big Japanese companies didn't consider the market big enough. In Japan, they were making some incredible stuff and way better than us Brits, but too expensive for our market.

[gridgway]

On the basis that linn have revenues of done £18m. I think your numbers are a bit squiffy!

[gridgway]

Interestingly as do naim.

[gridgway]

B&W 120m. Maybe not so dead after all!

[Ashley James]

But most is exported because this is a tiny market. I'll concede £20 million doubting it.

[356A]

I am pleased to see that the 'Flat Earth Society' is still alive and well - an old industry nickname for Linn Products, Naim Audio and Rega Turntables.

I first met Ivor when he used to flog Sondeks out of the back of his Estate Car to find the petrol money back to Glasgow.

The job of marketing that Linn did with Charlie Brennan and help from Julian Vereker of Naim was astounding.

I spent my years as a student working in what was then a very high end audio shop 2 late evenings a week and Saturdays.

We sold Linns and Naims by the bucketful and then also became dealers for many other ridiculously expensive brands.

I stuck with this part time job for about 8 years and also worked during holidays until a 'real' job got in the way.

My Hifi is stuck deeply in the past and I still use a really old pair of Klipsch LaScala speakers, a Futtermann HC3 OTL Power amp which was really hard to find with a Valve pre-amp I designed and built during my time as a student.

I have sadly, parked my Well Tempered Turntable and use a Levinson Model 390S CD Player .

I do have a collection of old valve amps which I haven't used for a very long time but I am still trying to find a pair of Jadis Eurythmie II loudspeakers which are the only speakers which may make me give up the Klipsch.

I could be tempted by the Sonus Faber Guarneri Evolution loudspeaker but they are a bit too difficult to drive for the Futtermann.

Happy times and I really don't spend enough time listening any longer.

We serviced & repaired Ivor's cars mostly Jaguar. XJS TWR was his personal transport at the time. Lovely, well read individual who didn't suffer fools. He asked me to set up and run a coating shop for him in order to control the finish on his products as many parts were farmed out & he wanted complete control on quality. I was humbled to be asked but I hadn't long set up my own bodyshop & wanted to give it a fair crack. I kept in touch & often seen him in the Baby Grand restaurant in Glasgow. I sold him a Healey which he auction for charity such was the man.

[gridgway]

Thanks for the bump! Anyone want to buy a superb or mega-superb streamer?