I’d
been searching for a preamp, so for a giggle I Googled “best preamp ever
audiogon” to see to see who had recommended what.
The
top hit was for tube preamps, but I didn’t want to limit my search to tubes.
The second-top hit was not it either – just preamps for sale.
But
the third and fourth hits were more like it. They came from this very thread. I
started reading. My reading extended over two nights. (Thanks guys!) My interest turned to
intrigue when I twigged that the preamp – the Lightspeed Attenuator of course –
was Australian (which is what I am and where I am).
What
really kept me reading was seeing actual users were replacing expensive and
much-loved amps – tubes even – with something straightforward and cheap (by
comparison).
Now, the OP here (thank you Pubul57) had made it
clear that the Lightspeed needs the right environment in which to work. A source ouputting 2V or more, which is pretty
much everything these days I believe, a short interconnect to the power amp
(three metres or less), low capacitance interconnects – and a power amp whose
input is preferably the industry standard of 47K ohms or more.
I checked the specs on my Halcro DM38. Only 10K
ohms on the RCA input. The Lightspeed outputs RCA only. That might be a
problem. But I wasn’t going to stop now, was I?
Just to test before shelling out, I plugged my
passive Schiit Sys into the Halcro. The Schiit outputs up to 5K ohm (not
dissimilar I believe to the most the Lightspeed puts out). So we are a long way
from the ideal 1:10 ratio, which would have us up around the 47K standard. But
the Schiit provided enough bass and volume to make me push ahead. It worked, at least. But I thought I was probably
going to need a buffer, so as to fix the impedance mismatch between the Lightspeed
and the Halcro.
And I should detail the rest of the system.
Speakers are a massive pair – Be-One, The One. Five drivers per cabinet, about
100 kgs each, sensitivity 89db. Streaming via an Auralic Aries Mini, listening
to 320 MPs, CD rips, hi-res files and DSD. Switching between DACs – the Aries,
an Emotiva and an R2R Audio-GD 11. Preamps on hand for comparison were the
Aries Mini again, a Xindak XB 8250, and a Geiseler preamp (another boutique
Australian product) (and the pre-outs of a few integrated, including a Jungson
JA-88D, Yamaha AS200, Harmon Kardon 990). There were two tube preamps around,
an Audile using Jan Philips 5814a tubes, and a SoundMaster Mk 23 using 2A3, but
the tubes were so different, I didn’t make comparisons with the Lightspeed. The room is roughly 30 foot long and 12 foot wide.
So the Lightspeed arrived. One great thing about
it – no burn-in. Because there is nothing
to burn it. That’s a relief. Just give it one minute to get warm. We’re off.
First impressions: this is good.
It was clear. Like water. There was no shortage
of bass. Or volume. Highs were clear. Volume – more than enough. I had it playing
around 2 o’clock to play it loud (90db, sitting four to five metres from the
speakers.) There is no sweet spot on the volume dial – the sound is the same
all the way. There was no channel imbalance.
That’s what it sounded like – which is to say,
it had little sound of its own.
It was dead silent – which I suppose is a
function of no gain and no mechanical parts to speak of. My room is very quiet,
so that silence is impressive – and necessary.
Whenever I get a new component, I make a point
of listening to it. By which I mean,
not comparing, but listening. (And I
only change one thing at a time – so I can be sure where the difference is
coming from.)
So only after a few days did I start to compare
– with a little bit of fear.
Comparison confirmed my suspicions: what the
Lightspeed delivered was good, but insufficient. It was approaching the
weaknesses commonly attributed to passive preamps. The attack on notes – be
they guitar strings or piano notes or kick drums or electronic bass bombs –
wasn’t quite there. That one thing amounted to the music losing life and shine.
But what was
there was all good – it just felt the thing was struggling, pushing the music
uphill. But it was clearly good enough that I had to know how it would sound
given the right conditions. So let’s get a buffer.
I got a Musical Fidelity X10v3 (not XD.) It puts
out just 33 ohms. It deploys two
military-spec tubes – which Musical Fidelity says are designed to withstand the
radiation of a nuclear war. Pity the rest of the system won’t survive.
And, voila. Now we’re talking.
If the taste was water before, it was water out
of a plastic cup. Now it’s water out of quality glass. Transparent.
All the life and dynamics were there. Transients
had zing. Slam had slam. If the recording has depth and height and placement
(ie soundstage), so does its reproduction.
It just sounded like I was hearing the music –
be it Billie Holiday, Kraftwerk, Crazy Horse or Chopin. The lack of distortion
from both components is quite the treat.
So, there you go. This will be old news to some of
you – but I had to share it, and the odd fact that I had to go so far afield to
discover something in my own backyard.
This thing really is ingenious. Theoretically, it seems to me the ideal preamp:
adding nothing, subtracting nothing, with no touching moving parts and
no noise, simply providing a channel
through which the music can flow. Like straight wire with gain – except there’s
no wire, only light dependent resistors, and no gain either.
