Mark - Welcome to the happy family. |
I own Ayon cd-5s after owning esoteric x01d2 and k-03 and other players.
I confirm what Melbguy1 is saying, and very happy with its sound and the pre-amplifier section in this unit is very good. I sold my ARC ref-3 pre-amp after buying ayon cd-5s. But to the Melbguy1 point, if possible change tubes to NOS 6h30p-dr. Parts connections sells 1986 for $80-90 a pair and they can do matching quad.
I have one question so. My amplifier (3 month old Krell 302E) has input impendence of 100k ohm thru RCA and 200k ohm thru XLR. Using the XLR connection from Ayon to Krell, every time pressing play button on Ayon (starting or re-starting CD) I hear very audible metallic ping sound coming form a speakers tweeters. Also the sound becomes noisy on loudly recorded cds. Again noise coming from tweeters. . This is not happening using RCA. Is that attributed to a high gain krell is getting using XLR outs?
In both cases I drive krell directly from ayon. The low or high gain switch on ayon does not affect that ping sound. Any input will be highly appreciated. Thank you. |
Sionlim, Congratulations on the Tylers!! Let us know how that works out.
Todd |
I have CD5s and had ping and noise through tweet and mid using balanced IC and not RCA both direct into Nuforce Ref 9V3SE mono blocks with input impedence of 22K ohm for both RCA and balanced. Ping stayed but all noise went away to totally silent and also better bass and mid when I switched to very well shielded balanced IC audiophile microphone cable from Stagg for $60 a pair and great sound to boot. Both the Ayon and Nuforce are true fully balanced designs so I wanted to stay balanced, and like the sound better than RCA by a smidge. |
Hi Gammajo, just repeating my reply from another thread fyi.. In regard to the metallic "ping" which you hear when you press play on your Ayon, this comes from the 6H30 tube filament and is very normal. Ayon do not use any negative feedback or compensators to erase tube noise or hum as most manufactures are doing. Boulder are the only company which properly understand negative feedback, but they are an exception. Most other applications of GNF have a negative impact on the sound.
Xlr cables help lower the noise floor through common mode noise rejection & better grounding, but also roughly double line level gain. The CD-5s already has high gain, and due to your Krell's high input impedance no doubt your over-juicing your amp which is causing the distortion. As a starting point, i'd recommend leaving the gain toggle set to 'low'. Remember the clipping point doesn't change with balanced cables, only the position on the volume control where that occurs. If the above doesn't solve your issue, i'd switch back to single ended cables which are apparently lowering the line level gain to an acceptable level. Regards, MG |
