Confused by ICE applications

According to one of the editorial reviews (can find it) Bel Canto's S300 suffers thin lower midrange but after placing it on anti-resonance cones sound becomes fuller. Rowland's case is milled from billet of aluminium.

In fact, on the Continuum the large flat surfaces of the chassis are ridged, to refract sound waves in those cases where it might be close to speakers. The tolerances on the Rowland chassis are .003". The nibs and screw threads for mounting boards, etc. are machined in, to the same tolerance. Like I said before, the Rowland chassis is no mere cosmetic design exercise, even though he highly values esthetic appeal.

Dave

Dave,

Thanks for the report on JRDG equipment. I knew from past reviews that Jeff pays attention to things like case design (Stereophile made special note of it in their review of the Model 2). However, I've never been able to look into one of his components and the "official" web is mum on the modifications and particulars of the application of the ICE units. So, thanks again for spelling it out, that's exactly the information I was looking for.

A few yrs back, I bought a few Acoustic Reality ICEPower monoblocks to drive my then Revel Salon.

The ICEPower monoblocks made me sell my Mark Levinson No.33H that I used to drive the Salon.

ICEPower is simply fantastic.

I now use a DarTZeel but kept all my Icepower stuff...I plan to build an ICEPower based HT...

btw, anyone know how the new ICEPower modules compare to the older ones? The new ones supposedly has much higher current then the older generation... but what else?

I haven't heard the DarTZeel equipment yet, but I'm very confident that it's stunning; given the reviews I've seen from trusted sources.

However, it's interesting to compare DarTZ and Rowland to see that there's more than one way to skin an audio cat. Inside the DarTZ pre-amp there's a whole infantry of cards lined up, filling a relatively large case. In the amazing Rowland Capri preamp there's almost nothing, with phono cards about the size of the last joint of my little finger. Both work, apparently very well, but the design approaches are worlds apart.

BTW, the Rowland is designed by one guy and, I suspect, the same is true with DarTZeel. I know for fact that Rowland feel very strongly that his approach is "right" and I suspect that the DarTZ designer feels the same way.

Dave