I have only linked to the first part of the three part review. I highly recommend you read the comments as well. I asked the reviewer a question about the Pink Faun before I bought the Innuos Statement. I found his answer insightful.
Innuos Statement Review
I focused on music selections I know well across the genres of rock/pop, jazz, classical, soul/R&B, and classical. I used a "non-blind" method playing a 1 minute 30 second to 2 minute section of a recording before switching from one server to the other and then repeating the same recording for an immediate comparison. I did the comparison over a two hour period, taking periodic listening breaks. Before providing my overall impressions of the Antipodes Statement, I note that I immediately compared the Statement to the Antipodes DX3 without burning the Statement in. The Antipodes DX3 had been thoroughly burned in before the comparison (more than 500 hours of use). Without burn in, the Statement and the Antipodes DX 3 sounded very similar to one another. I'm confident that I would have been guessing which was which if I was blindfolded and had to name the server I was hearing on any given recording. I repeated this exercise after the Statement had burned in for one hour. At this point it seemed the Statement's soundstage had gotten a little wider and only slightly deeper. It also seemed the vocals on the Statement had become slightly clearer than on the Antipodes DX3. I did no further comparisons until now. The following are my subjective impressions of the Statement after four days of burn in compared to the Antipodes DX 3 server in my system.
The Statement threw a slightly wider soundstage than the Antipodes DX3.
The Statement had a significantly deeper soundstage than the Antipodes DX3.
The Statement and the Antipodes DX3 had the same soundstage height.
The Statement resolved moderately more than the Antipodes DX3. By this I mean it provided more recording details than the Antipodes DX 3. It was not a night and day difference. It was apparent on most, but not all, recordings I considered.
Vocals presented clearer/crisper (better "enunciation" if you will) via the Statement than the Antipodes DX3.
The Statement provided superior bass differentiation in the lowest and mid bass regions. With the Statement, the bass drum performance did not cloud either a stand up bass or electric bass performance--provided the recording/mastering engineers sufficiently separated the performances on the recording. The Antipodes DX3 is a very good bass performer. But it slightly trailed the Statement.
The Statement placed more air between the instruments and performers than the Antipodes DX3.
The Statement excelled at acoustical instrument presentation. A reeded instrument sounded convincingly "real." The Antipodes DX3 does this well too...just not as well. Percussion instruments also benefit from this attribute. The Statement allowed me to hear more definition in the wood block, the guiro, shakers, all cymbals I heard, chimes, a gong. Again, the Antipodes DX3 was very good at percussive instrument representation. The Statement was simply better.
Both the Statement and the Antipodes DX3 provided high quality believable piano reproduction in all genres. The only significant difference I heard between the two servers on piano performance was found in Alfredo Rodriguez's rendition of "Chan Chan." There, the Statement seemed to handle the quick staccato notes and the unique decay issues of this piece more believably than the Antipodes DX3. But the difference was not night and day.
My overall impression of the Statement is that it provided superior high quality, believable digital music reproduction regardless of genre. I consider it an across the board upgrade in musical reproduction in my system over the Antipodes DX3. My impression of the Antipodes DX3 is that it is a high value product that held up very well in comparison to the Statement. The Statement retails for twice as much as the DX3's retail price when it was in production. If the Statement's performance after four days of burn in was rated as a 100 I would rate the Antipodes DX3 completely burned in as a 75. I will be keeping both these music servers. Hopefully this review helps those in the market for a music server.
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@david_ten Hopefully you have read this review of the Pink Faun server:https://www.hifi-advice.com/blog/review/digital-reviews/music-server-reviews/pink-faun-2-16x-1-3/ I have only linked to the first part of the three part review. I highly recommend you read the comments as well. I asked the reviewer a question about the Pink Faun before I bought the Innuos Statement. I found his answer insightful. |
@astewart8944 Al, I have read the review. But I had not read the comments. Thank you for pointing me to them. They are informative as well. In many ways those conversations align with @audiotroy 's here in terms of his position that each server (he discusses/carries) has a "particular sound" and needs to be chosen in context of one's system and priorities. Are you open to offering your 'take-away(s)' on the Pink Faun units / Christiaan Punter's response to you and others? Thanks. As an aside, Sound Galleries and Baetis were mentioned earlier in this thread, which is why I did not list them. |
@david_ten and others: In order to try and answer the question posted above, I thought it would be helpful to first set out Christiaan Punter's (CP) full response to a question I asked him back in April 2019--it follows here (I will then post separately my "take away" regarding CP's response): "Musicality remains a relative term and a dangerous one to use. What sounds musical to me may not do so to you. Either way, indeed, in terms of audiophile performance, the Pink Faun is the best I have heard. Since you already own the DX3, you already have a significant portion of the CX+EX sound and I’m not sure if upgrading to CX+EX would yield enough to make this change worthwhile. More importantly, since you use the Joseph Audio Pearl 3s (very nice speakers btw), the balance on your end will work out differently than on my side with the Wilsons that I used for this review. It’s always a matter of balance and in my case, the Wilsons need some warming up. The Josephs may not need this, unless that is how you like it. Now that I have Kroma Audio Carmen, I think the conclusion might be a little different for me as well, with more love for the Pink Faun’s extreme transparency, although successive reviews of other DACs and streaming endpoints do seem to sustain my preference for the deeper, more 3D sound of the Antipodes combo. Your 925’s are pretty neutral but the Joseph speakers are on the full and warm side, as is the Aeris. The Corus+PSU is very transparent but it’s a Rowland, so it is still a little sweet. Less so with the PSU, btw. But by changing the Aeris for the Aqua Formula xHD you will gain a lot of neutrality and transparency and lose some of that Aeris smoothness. The net effect would be a more transparent, cleaner, even more hi-res sound. If you’d then swap the DX3 for the Pink Faun, the sound will head more in that direction but I think you might be amazed at the extra resolution and refinement. Now, I think your system can certainly make the best of that combination but the question is if you want to retain the current balance or are happy to have it more more toward neutrality. In conclusion, looking at your two proposed solutions, I’d do neither and would first audition the Aqua. If you like it then proceed to trying the Pink Faun. Alternatively, you could also move straight to the Pink Faun as the Aeris+PSU is still very good as well, just a little too sweet for my current taste but that aspect may actually combine very well with the Pink Faun’s extra neutrality. In conclusion, I tend to prefer multibit R2R DACs (Wadia, CH, Aqua Formula xHD) over Delta/Sigma (Aeris and the large majority of current DACs) because the latter nearly always sound somewhat restrained and/or filtered to me. But I know that opinions vary on this subject so I’d suggest investigating that aspect for yourself. Also, there are deviations, the PS Audio PWD MKII for example, is a Delta/Sigma design but sounds almost like a Wadia, not restrained or filtered at all. But now I’m starting to ramble… Let me know how you get on. Happy to answer follow up questions." Reply |
@david_ten It is probably is worth noting that I have listened to the Innuos Statement with the Aqua Formula xHD DAC, however, not in my listening room. The speakers were YGA Hailey 2.2s, which I am fond of--but do not own. I liked the presentation--although I thought the overall sound profile needed to be "warmer." I think CP describes Rowland gear's sound profile very accurately. And I think his Antipodes description is accurate (that should make @hehaw77--very happy :-)). In my system, I think the Innuos Statement is actually providing greater transparency than the Antipodes DX3--which I noted in my review. When CP said that the DX3 is providing much of (but not all of) the CX+EX combo, I'm fairly certain he is correct. As others have noted, the Innuos Mk3 with the Phoenix re-clocker is chasing the Statement sound. BTW I have heard the Mk3 with the re-clocker--it is very good. I personally don't think it is 95% of the Statement's SQ having now listened to the Statement for many hours. But, I do think it is a very high value proposition. I read everything on the internet about Pink Faun before I pulled the trigger on the Innuos Statement. At that time, I couldn't find a Pink Faun US distributor (that has since been rectified) and the Pink Faun website was consistently down. Not simply down overnight. I mean down for what seemed like a long time. That puzzled me because, let's face it, a music server, is, well, a computer built to specifically handle music. It seemed to me that a company building computers should be fanatical about whether or not the server housing their website was operational. It made me question Pink Faun's operational capabilities to service their brand in the U.S. I confess that might not be a totally fair assessment. But at the time, I was shopping for a new server for a significant amount of hard earned money and the details began to matter a great deal. Hope this helps as you shop for a server. |
Of course I’ll comment on the below. The EX alone sounds better than the DX3 ; the CX alone sounds better. DX3 is old tech even if its been upgraded. It’s been noted already that the combo sounds much better. Than each unit on its own. Others have also commented that comparing the DX3 to other servers is not a correct comparison. I Really don’t know what more can be said if people want to believe something regardless of facts. I’d venture to say this person has not listened to the combo. Almost positive of that..in fact anyone agreeing with that statement I’d ask if they have heard the combo. If you have then prefer something else fair enough; as I’ve heard both and prefer the combo over anything I’ve heard to date. I can also say the MK2 with my clocks give me a significant portion of the Innuos Statement sound; which is somewhat correct, and upgrading to the Innuos Statement wouldn’t give me significant up-gradable experience. Which is somewhat true; but I’d be comparing old tech to Innuos top of line. Quote: "Since you already own the DX3, you already have a significant portion of the CX+EX sound and I’m not sure if upgrading to CX+EX would yield enough to make this change worthwhile." |
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