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dCS Puccini Clock

I had yesterday the oportunity to hear for first time the Puccini clock.

I must admit that I was a little sceptical. The system consisted of:

Howland preamp HP-200 SE
Howland amp RADIA SE
Avalon Indra
Transparent power cleaner / station ?
I can't tell which cables

Well the effect is quite amazing and you can easily recognize it in a blind hearing. If I have to describe it I would say, you become aware of the hall / the space in which the recording has been done. The difference is very noticeable when you switch the clock off, suddenly the music sounds dryer, shorter and the space all around the whole music desapears.

I heard:
Luiz Bonfa plays and sing Bossa Nova (Verve)
Bruckner 4th by Jaap van Zweden (bad SACD & interpretation)
Bruckner 4th by Günter Wand (the last recording)
Ports of Call by Eiji Oue (Ref. Rec. bravo Prof. Johnson you are a great sound engeneer!)

One of these days I will take it home and have a test on my system ... and will make some blind hearing with my wife ;-)

I will report then about the experience.
clavil
bar81
791 posts
 
I understand and my comment stands; that's ridiculous.
blackstonejd
153 posts
 
What a bunch of nonsense.
elberoth2's avatar
elberoth2
1,223 posts
 
Nothing wrong with having to pay for extra features that expand units functionality, IMO.

If they ask you to pay for software update that fixes bugs etc - that would be another story.
blackstonejd
153 posts
 
It is gouging.
blackstonejd
153 posts
 
I think dCS is sort of a joke, at this point. I mean the prices for their products, as good as they are, are so disgustingly inflated now that they are basically the exclusive playthings for oil sheiks and other greedy corporate types. At a certain point, "high-end" just becomes "high-falutin" nonense. Selling a licensing for firmware that enables functionality that the unit should have included to begin with? The only reason for requiring such a license is that they know that once the upsampling functionality is enabled, users will be able to use music server on the cheap products like Squeezebox and Transporter to great effect, bypassing the need for U-Clock, Scarlatti Upsampler and whatever other outrageously overpriced USB to SPDIF converter they can cook up this year. They are basically holding proper music server functionality hostage.

If Microsoft could enable true 1080P output on its standard XBOX with the flick of a switch but we were expected to pay them a license for the firmware update there would be mass upheaval. I have $100 sound cards and $300 PC graphics cards that get almost monthly driver updates free of charge. My computer motherboard practically gets a free firmware update everymonth--in some cases enabling radically new functionality. But as an audiophile, I am supposed to simply lap up David J M Steven's marketing bullshit and pay for a basic functionality fix--why exactly? I can only conclude that dCS finds its customers to be saps who are easily parted from their money.

I wouldn't give them another nickel.
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