Gryphon Diablo 300 vs McIntosh Mc601

Hello Daniel, I have dealt with this dealer for many years they have always gone out of their way to help me sorry you had a bad experience there. 

Can I suggest give them another chance but more importantly buy the best equipment you possibly can and currently Gryphon is the best.

I have previously owned big tubes Amps and I have heard McIntosh I like McIntosh but nothing controls a speaker (Bass, Mid and High Frequency) like Gryphon and in my opinion they sound very similar to Tubes with none of the downside. 

Forget the dealer experience and buy the best equipment, that for me is Gryphon!!!

Kind regards Bigpond

Thanks Lrsky, audioman58, rwwear,

I am waiting for the dealer to delivery a demo Diablo 300. Cant wait to see If the Diablo 300 can do what it did in audition with 802; if it can out perform the MC601 in driving 800 significantly.

Daniel.

Hi everyone,

I had 2 nites to hang around with Gryphon Diablo 300 and my current set of B&W800 Diamond/McIntosh MC601. Of course, the input is media center PC using JRiver 21. I have checked all the setting in Audio Setup section to make sure I do follow the setting recommended by Gryphon.

Audition: The Diablo 300 surprised me with deep and well controlled sound across all spectrums; it drove my B&W 800 diamond in very signature way of Gryphon. For those doesn’t like the dark sound, it’s actually even better. Since B&W 800 is quite bright and forward, IMHO, this pair actually help each other in balancing the sound. The music was reproduced again, I knew that I have said this, in very natural way, very refined and detail. I am not sure how to describe the unique sound of Gryphon amp, this happens when I was listening to other Gryphon Amp as well as Gryphon Amp powering different speaker; the way I can try is I can feel the distance between each tone , each node of music played as well as between vocal and music instrumental sound. In short, it’s just pleasure to listen to. When crank up to more than 38 steps of volume control on Diablo 300, I guess about 70% or more, it’s really loud but no distortion, not grainy at all. If anyone doubt about the ability of Diablo 300 in driving B&W 800 Diamond, please don’t worry, it punch the base out of my speaker in the way that I am more than satisfied. After 3 hours of listening none-stop, I really enjoy it. My ears are warmed up and so the Diablo 300.

Comparison: Having listening McIntosh MC601 and B&W800 diamond for long time, with all the daily albums, I don’t really need to do A/B listening to tell at all. The Diablo 300 outperformed McIntosh 601 in bass control especially at lower level of volume; and it does better job in sound imaging aspect, it please your ear more. The down side comparing to the big MAC are: sound of music seem to be smaller, shorter; especially for those made from flute, guitar and drum (I did pick these up when listening at the dealer place paring with 802 Diamond as well but not quite sure it’s the speaker differences or the amp). As I am not a musician so put it this way, the sound when powered by Diablo 300 is like produced from a guitar with too small box comparing to when Powered by MC601....When I changed to non-tube preamp, MC601 still sounds more tube alike than Diablo 300. Another point that I guess can take it as “Con” of Gryphone Diablo 300 is when the volume is rank up high, it has a bit of flare (not much at all) at the very end of the base sound while McIntosh MC601 still hold it tight and strong. Physically, the Diablo 300 have more than enough power to drive the B&W 800, but get really hot; while the MC601 is effortlessly powering the 800 diamond in just bit warm temperature, very relax.

Issue: While having near perfect sound re-production, I have found it very frustrated with Diablo 300 DAC. The problem only raises when turn off the amp and turn it on again. Please note that I use PC (I have 2 media centers) as input. After the first 3 hours listening to Diablo 300, I turn it off as had to go somewhere, when I turn it back on again (PC is still on all the time), the PC failed to register the Diablo 300, not showing at all in Device Management. I find it sometime have to re-scan of hardware change in USB node to make the Diablo appeared again or restart PC or have to turn off the PC, turn Amp on first then PC.....this happened throughout the 1st night results a lot frustration; then next day, I couldn’t make it work again with USB input from any PC; had to use analogue input after an external DAC. Another Issue I have came a crossed was the signal frequency handling: when change track in 6/24 Bit, 44.1khz CD Rip to MP3 format, the Diablo still display locked signal of 44.1 khz, 16 bit depth; it stopped intermittently after half of minute into the song then finally mute after few minutes playing. I have tried this for few times, same thing happened. Please note that this hasn’t happened before with my system when using NAD M51 DAC and PeachTree GrandPre Preamp using USB.

 I have seen this symptom before when auditioning all the NAD sound processor prior to their T187. I guess, the fact that Diablo 300 cut off all power to the DAC module - not even idle (this may different from Kalliope), may contribute the instability of the device to PC (nothing to do with frequency handling issue of course). However, I am not sure this may be just the particular DAC that given to me inside the Demo Diablo 300, or it is the issue with product line...

In conclusion, does the Diablo 300 sound wonderful with B&W 800 Diamond, well it does beautiful job; does it outperforms the McIntosh MC601 by much, not really; it does not have some good characteristics of the sound from big Mac (instrumental, airy and dynamic sound) ; does it attract me enough to buy, yes it is, since it came nicely as integrated box, it can be my next amplifier for next- on- the- list like Pantheon or similar Speaker from Gryphon. I would buy it and spare the MC601 for another set of speaker if it can take PC input smoothly enough. In my opinion, there will be more and more people like myself, who use PC alike as source for their HiFi system, in the future (if not a lot already). Guess that I will be with the McIntosh C2500 for now, and look at Gryphon as my next upgrade.

Thanks everyone!

Daniel